Book Collecting at the Book Festival: Service Hours Opportunity

COSTA MESA, Calif. - Oct. 2, 2015 - PRLog -- Come join Kids and Smiles at the Orange County Children’s Book Festival, Sunday October 4 at Orange Coast College. Kids and Smiles will be collecting NEW toys and gently used books for pediatric patients.

Kids and Smiles has been organizing youth-run events the last few years. Rather than simply dropping off toys, kids organize and take part in social themed events, for example, Halloween and Easter. Events are free, and proceeds (toys, books, DVDs) are then delivered by the volunteers of Kids and Smiles, to local hospitals. All cash donations (100%) are used to hold events, or purchase gifts for donations.

In 2011, when Martand Bhagavatula was 8 years old, as a volunteer for Kids Who Care organization, he played for pediatric patients at a local hospital and felt saddened that they had so little "fun" things in their rooms, and so little opportunity to socialize with children outside the hospital. In 2012, he founded Kids and Smiles to bring smiles to kids in the hospital.

To date, Kids and Smiles has donated almost 800 toys, books, and DVDs to local pediatric units and has been featured on Good Morning America and other media. Martand Bhagavatula recently received the prestigious FRED Award from the Festival of Children Foundation.

http://abcnews.go.com/Lifestyle/boy-11-starts-foundation-...

http://localemagazine.com/festival-of-children-foundation...

http://parentingoc.com/2015/06/lh-martand-bhagavatula/