By Cara Martinez
Staff Writer
Prescription for Happiness spreads love, happiness and holiday cheer to various children and adult patients in local hospitals by decorating rooms with festive and seasonal decorations for each holiday of the year.
Junior Sophie Greenhouse, Club President started Prescription for Happiness on September 11 2015 and has moderated the club for two years. The club consists of nine officers, Sophomore Bianca Lebosnoyani, Vice President, Sophomore, Mallie Axelrad,Treasurer,Sophomores Cassidy Waterson and Hilary Roesenfeld, Secretaries, two Historians, Sophomore, Ali Beddingfieldand and Junior, Charlotte Manley and two club representatives,Senior, Carly Dossik and Sophomore, Nicole Barns.
“We all collaborate as officers and I met a couple girls I didn’t know before and this club and it brought us all together,”Waterson said. “I attend the decorations and we are all super helpful and everyone is positive and we all want the club to be so successful, so we all put in our best work.”
Greenhouse was inspired to start her club after spending Halloween with one of her best friends who was sick with Ulcerative Colitis who was hospitalized for months. The hospital was completely decorated with decorations and the hospital patients went trick-or-treating from room to room. After seeing how much of a difference in morale it made for her friend, she wanted to do the same for others.
Photos of club members and events:
“I saw my friend so happy that day so I wanted to make a club, Greenhouse said.” I have seen how ugly and dreary hospitals are and all I wanted to do was make kids better, so that’s how it was born.”
During the club meetings they have treats and parties to celebrate the holidays. They make decorations such as cut out hearts, snowflakes, paper turkeys, and leprechaun hats. They additionally write notes to child patients and make care packages that have holiday themed rubber ducks, Hershey’s kisses and toys inside them. Outside of the meetings they have bake sales, booths and fundraisers and they make about $200-$500 per fundraiser.
“We put ourselves out into the community with bake sales and the hometown fair booth really boosted our image,” Waterson said. “Everybody there was interested in what we did and people there had something nice to say about our club. “We also got more recognition through club day which was cool.”
hospitals they have volunteered at:
In addition to hand making the decorations during meetings, Greenhouse purchases her decorations from party city and online. They have decorated a total of three hospitals such as Torrance of Memorial, Little Company of Mary, and De Vita. They decorate each hospital for every holiday and they are planning on adding a fourth hospital, Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles.
“Our future goals are to expand and start in the Torrance District and and hopefully at the end of this year or next year we will be at Vistamar School District as well,” Greenhouse said. “I want to make Prescription for Happiness bigger than just a costa club because I want to help as many people as I can.”
The club members recently wrote over 175 valentines for child patients.They are currently working on their next project which is decorating for St. Patrick’s Day which will take place on Feb 25 and 26. They decorate the rooms three to four weeks before the holiday. The purpose of her club was to spread happiness and she wanted to put a medical twist to the name, so she came up with Prescription for Happiness. Greenhouse brainstormed for a few days and she thought this name would be perfect since the club is all about promoting happiness.
Click to go to the club website:
“The whole goal is to put smiles on peoples faces and we want to spread holiday cheer and make people happy because spending the holidays in the hospital and not being able to celebrate it like you would at home really stinks,” Greenhouse said. “We don’t want people to be upset and feel that way.
The club received the majority of their money through personal donors who consisted of relatives, neighbors, sponsors and strangers. The club members also managed to exceed their goal of $5,000 and raise $10,000 in the past four months. They have been sponsored by Afterburn Fitness who gave gym coupons to members where 100% of the proceeds go to the club.
“I have had people walking up to me all the time, nurses, doctors, family members, patients, and little kids and we have been told that what we are doing makes such a huge difference,”Greenhouse said. “If we could put up one more decoration that puts a smile on at least one person’s face, we know we are helping at least one person.
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