You can visit Operation Smile’s website for LOTS of information about them: https://www.operationsmile.org/

From WIkipedia: “Operation Smile is a nonprofit medical service organization founded in 1982 by Dr. William P. Magee Jr. and his wife Kathleen S. Magee. It is headquartered in Virginia Beach, Virginia. In addition to providing cleft lip and palate repair surgeries to children worldwide, Operation Smile works as a non-governmental organization to reduce the occurrence of cleft lips and palates worldwide.”

Close To My Heart has partnered with Operation Smile for MANY years, and with the help of Close To My Heart Makers everywhere, has provided many operations for children around the world who were born with cleft lip or cleft palate.

Over the years, many customers have ‘rounded up’ their orders, or purchased special stamp sets (like D2190 - “Your Smile” in the current catalog) to support Operation Smile. For each “Your Smile“ stamp set sold, $7 of the proceeds is donated to Operation Smile.

My own involvement has grown over the years - from asking customers to round up their orders, donating the money made from the sale of used stamp sets, to holding an Operation Smile Bingo fundraiser, and now to adding Silent Auctions at my Craft’n’Crops - and I am excited that the amount that I am able to collect and contribute to Operation Smile has grown! Last year, our efforts totalled about $330 - which was enough to provide ONE operation with some toward a second operation (they cost about $240 each). At a recent Craft’n’Crop, the Silent Auction and some extra donations totalled $440 ! That’s ALMOST two donated operations! So I hope my papercrafting and other crafting friends will help me continue to support Operation Smile - perhaps we can hit five operations by the end of the year!

You can donate by going to my Close To My Heart sales page www.pathawkins.ctmh and creating an ‘order’. Then, either place your order and add the donation at checkout OR just click the shopping basket icon to ‘checkout’ without ordering - there will still be an opportunity to make an Operation Smile donation!