Scavenger Hunters Gather Food for Needy Families

More than 800 pouds of non-perishable food was collected last Saturday in Our Lady of Lourdes' third annual Souper Scavenger Hunt.

Nine teams went door-to-door throughout the village of Malverne collecting tuna cans, jars of peanut butter and other packaged goods to stock up the parish's food pantry, which provides for needy families.

Super Dupers, a team that consisted of junior Girl Scouts from Troop 2337 collected the most food. Working together, the six girls - Victoria Romano, Lauren Trabulsi, Annalyn Pupke, Jocelyn Saccullo, Ruth NcDermott and Deirdre Knight - along with two of their moms, hauled in 256 pounds to win the top prize, gift certificates to Angelo's Pizza and Scooops ice cream parlor.

I guess practice makes perfect as this was the third consecutive year the troop participated in the scavenger hunt.

Piggy Pennie took second place, and a gift certificate to Connolly Station, and the next runners-up also walked away with prizes donated by other local merchants along with a feeling of satisfaction for having spent the day helping others.

Team Swag, which included Katherine Miraglia, Nicole Manza, Casey Brady and Megan Mazza, members of OLL's Youth Ministry, brought in an impressive 111 pounds. The Gumballs, which were made up of members of three different families - the Ledwiths, Garzones and Lawlers - also collected more than 100 pounds, as did the Blue People, which included Barbara and Jesse, Kietbowir ,and Ian and Aidan Rieger.

The teams were awarded bonus points if they found some of the most in-demand items, including tunafish, peanut butter and snacks.

Originally, the event was supposed to take place on March 31, but inclement weather forced coordinators to postpone it to May 12, which was also the same day the U.S. Postal mailcarriers were running their own food collection drive. 

"It did come out better than expected," said Youth Ministry Coordinator Linda Baldacchino, of this year's scavenger hunt.

"We didn't think we had a lot of people at first, but some people came today that were surprises, that we didn't know were coming," she explained. "And the teams that did come, did so great so we still did get a lot of food."

She added, "We do hope to get more people involved in next year." 

Look for details about next year's scavenger hunt on Patch.