Moses Lake 8-year-old helps feed the homeless
Courtesy photo Nevaeh Reeves wrote a note for every plate, helped cook the food and handed out 24 Thanksgiving dinners for the homeless.
Courtesy photo Nevaeh Reeves said she doesn’t like to see people who are hungry. She helped cook and deliver 24 Thanksgiving dinners to homeless people in Moses Lake.
Courtesy photo She didn’t take the turkey out, but Nevaeh helped with every other task of making Thanksgiving dinners for the homeless.
MOSES LAKE — Eight-year-old Nevaeh Reeves doesn't like to see people go hungry.
With the support of her family Nevaeh has been doing something about it, especially at Thanksgiving and Christmas, for the last couple of years. “I like to feed the homeless people,” Nevaeh said. So the day before Thanksgiving “we make food and then we hand-deliver it to people.”
For the holiday that meant Thanksgiving dinners. “We went by the library,” the Moses Lake Public Library, to Carl Ahlers Park (across the street from Frontier Middle School), and along Stratford Road. There was also a man looking for some help to get home, standing outside a local grocery, and Nevaeh delivered a meal to him also.
She didn't stop there. Nevaeh and her family also made baskets for a couple of families, and at the last minute made up a third basket. And with her family's help, and accompanied by an officer from the Moses Lake Police Department, she delivered them all.
She wrote a note and added it to each package. “I put 'Happy Thanksgiving' and 'You matter,'” she said. In total she delivered 24 Thanksgiving meals, along with the three Thanksgiving baskets.
Nevaeh's mom Heather Welker supervises the kitchen. “The day before (the delivery) Mom starts cooking and when I come home from school, I start helping,” Nevaeh said. For Thanksgiving “we made stuffing, turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, and – oh, butter braid. Oh, and we also made rolls.” She helped carve the turkey and stir the stuffing and make the rolls and bread.
The cooking is pretty fun. “One of favorite things to do with my mom is cook,” Nevaeh said.
The holiday season isn't over, of course. “I also do (food distribution) at Christmas.”
Nevaeh doesn't confine her activities to November and December. Sometimes she sees people holding signs asking for help when she goes to the store with her mom, she said. “I ask my mom if we can get some deli food and give it to them.”
Nevaeh has been working to feed people since she was 6 years of age. Her stepdad Montie Welker said there was a family, a grandmother and five grandchildren, in need of some help at Christmas. Nevaeh was part of that project, and since then she has looked for opportunities to help people.
“I like seeing people happy and it made me happy,” she said.
Cheryl Schweizer can be reached via email at education@columbiabasinherald.com.