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CONCORD When Amy Cervantes throws a birthday party for children, some of them try to give the gifts back to her.
Many of them have never had a birthday party or gotten a present, she said. They don't understand why they're getting one now.
The children are homeless.
Cervantes and her husband, John, founded the nonprofit Birthday Blessings in 2005 to give birthday parties for Charlotte-area homeless children. The all-volunteer group - now operating in Mecklenburg, Union and York counties - will introduce itself to Cabarrus County next Sunday with a family event at Frank Liske Park.
Admission is free with a donation of a new, unwrapped birthday gift, a new baby item or new party supplies and decorations.
Charlotte-based Birthday Blessings has distributed more than 2,500 birthday gifts to homeless children and more than 6,000 birthday snack bags to the children and their classmates.
The group is expanding to Cabarrus at the request of Smart Start/Cabarrus Partnership for Children, Amy Cervantes said. It will offer its services to Cabarrus County Family Promise, CVAN Domestic Violence Program and other organizations that help the homeless.
The Cervantes started Birthday Blessings out of a desire to raise their children with a love and commitment for giving to people in need.
The effort started with a monthly birthday party at one homeless shelter and now reaches shelters across the region.
Birthday Blessings provides 25 to 30 in-school birthday parties each month for homeless students and their classmates, while keeping the child's homelessness confidential.
The group gives "blessing baskets" filled with bibs, bottles, diapers and other essentials to mothers of infants and toddlers at various homeless shelters and other housing programs.
The organization has expanded beyond North Carolina, with chapters in Indiana and Ohio, and other states to come.
"It's a little known fact that there are many more homeless people than the average person realizes, and not enough services for them," Cervantes told me in an interview last week.
From December 2008 through the spring, the Cabarrus County Schools and Kannapolis City Schools combined had a250 students identified as homeless, said Elizabeth Albright of the Cabarrus Partnership for Children.
Cabarrus County Family Promise, an interfaith network of churches that provides temporary housing for homeless families, has space for 14 people at a time, Albright said. Family Promise gets eight to 10 referrals a week, she said.
"It's a much bigger number than people anticipate in this area," Albright said of the homeless population.
Seeing the look on the kids' faces when Birthday Blessings throws them a party, Cervantes said, makes the effort all worthwhile.
"We've had kids as old as 8 or 9 who'd never had a birthday party before," she said. One was 16.
The look on their faces when you sing happy birthday to them?
It's one of pride and empowerment, she said, knowing their birthday is worthy enough to celebrate.
