Bare Necessities is an ongoing project of Family HomeStead and is overseen by our board. We give a welcome bag of personal care items to each family who comes into our Emergency Housing Program. These items include: laundry soap, toilet paper, bath soap, body lotion, shampoo, combs and brushes, deodorant, shavers and shaving cream, feminine hygiene products, toothbrushes, and toothpaste. We also often need diapers, baby wipes and pull-ups.

Please be sure to contact Family HomeStead directly before doing a general collection of either personal care products or cleaning supplies so that we can discuss specific needs. Because of storage constraints, we are unable to accept extremely large quantities of any one item at one time.

Also, please purchase items that are of a size a family would use. For example, giant size containers of laundry detergent, bleach, or other cleaning supplies are too large for us to distribute to clients. Likewise, travel-size items are inappropriate for families and will be given away by Family HomeStead to organizations that can utilize them. Client families do not have dishwashers, so dishwasher soap is not needed.

Our Current Bare Necessities Needs Are:

  • Buckets
  • Brooms
  • Mops
  • Lysol or All-purpose cleaner
  • Pine-Sol