HOT provides a magical Christmas experience to struggling children and their families through our Sugar Plum Fairies Program. Thanks to this program, hundreds of local children are selected each year to receive gifts and support to make their holiday season brighter and more memorable.
We work with local school districts and other organizations to identify children who need our help the most. Since Sugar Plum Fairies started in 2020, we have supported 674 children and have the funding to select between 250-275 children in 2024.
Local families are nominated by teachers, principals, and other school administrators from the West Valley. Nomination forms include contact information for the nominator and the family’s guardian as well as some basic information about the children and a place for the nominator to tell us why the family is a good fit for our program.
Our volunteers on the Recipient Committee read every nomination that is submitted. They then work with the family’s guardian to collect more detailed information. Once we have all the information, the Recipients Committee has the tough job of determining which families will be selected for the Sugar Plum Fairies.
To keep our Arizona Qualified Charitable Organization (QCO) status, all of the families we select must be low income or dealing with a chronic illness or physical disability in the immediate family. Selected families will typically have multiple children with at least one child in elementary school.
If you are a teacher or school administrator and would like to nominate a family, reach out to our Recipients Committee (recipients@hotcommunityfoundation.org) and they will make sure you are notified when nominations start. Nominations are typically open the last two weeks of August each year.
We pride ourselves on customizing the gifts each family receives!
Our Recipients Committee works tirelessly to make sure our shopping teams don’t just have clothing sizes for each child, but also information like their favorite color, hobbies, what they really need and want for Christmas. With this, our shoppers make sure each child has something special to open for Christmas.
Gifts are mostly clothes, but we make sure to include some fun items as well! Each child will get:
- A weeks worth of outfits, a coat, and shoes
- A dress up holiday outfit that will coordinate with their siblings
- Matching holiday PJs
- Two personalized toys selected from their wish list
- A stocking filled with hygiene essentials, snacks and small activities
All gifts are new – we don’t include any previously worn clothes or used toys.
Each family also receives a grocery gift card for food and a fun Christmas Eve basket with treats, games, and activities for the whole family to enjoy.
Once all the gifts are purchased and wrapped, the fun really begins!
We want every family in our program to feel special and to feel the support of the community around them. Each family gets a dedicated time for their Gift Presentation without the distraction of other children and other families in the room. Each child gets to meet and interact with Santa (and sometimes Mrs. Claus too!) while the parents and guardians are able to meet some of our amazing volunteers. The children get their picture with Santa and get to open a gift (or two) right then. It’s a magical experience for the children and for the parents.
At the end, the family gets to take the rest of the gifts home with them to open on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.
Seeing my children’s smiles and excitement was the most memorable part of this experience.
In our house Christmas is about giving, so contributing to the Sugar Plum Fairies was a perfect avenue for us, with HOT as a wonderful conduit.
Our experience with Santa was perfect! As a mom with a child with autism and six kids, sometimes events can be very overwhelming. But Sugar Plum Fairies was very easy as everyone was so helpful and kind. We are very thankful for the experience, gifts, and smiles at Christmastime. It was a tough year for us, so every gift opened, the shoes, the clothes, the grocery gift cards, was another burden lifted off my shoulders.
We were most impacted this past Christmas by HOT’s vast amount of gifts and energy given to our family. My children loved the blankets, and they came in very helpful! Thank you to all! You make a difference!
Sugar Plum Fairies made what was a struggle, a beautiful experience and Holiday for my family. Thank you so much!
The girls’ favorite gifts were the pajamas! Their favorite part of Sugar Plum Fairies was spending time with Santa. Thank you HOT Community for helping us provide a wonderful Christmas for our daughters.
Everything was very helpful, the gifts, the grocery cards, and the Christmas dinner. Thank you HOT Community!
The Sugar Plum Fairies floated in like angels to create sweet memories for kiddos who were overjoyed with all of the gifts and beautiful packages.
My family was impacted during a difficult time by such wonderful and amazing people! I will never forget you.
I have to say that this really was an unforgettable experience. The fact that it was personalized and the attention to detail was just amazing. I was humbled to receive the support and generosity from the Sugar Plum Fairies. It brought tears to my eyes and I get emotional just thinking about it.
The most memorable experience was picking up the presents and taking pictures with Mrs. Claus. The kids have never had a beautiful experience like this before. It is a moment to cherish forever.
