Mornings With Gina Birch

Food wine and fundraising for The Heights Foundation, was record setting Friday night. That is when the annual Love Your Neighbor event took place. The premier fundraiser for the Fort Myers based foundation featured a sit down dinner and a live auction. More than $680 thousand was raised.

The Heights Foundation

The Heights Foundation is one of my favorite organizations. Its purpose is to uplift the underserved children and families in the Harlem Heights community off of Gladiolus drive. When I first moved to Fort Myers, it was an area you locked your doors driving through and stayed clear of after dark. I’ve seen first hand the drastic improvements here. The work of The Heights Foundation has been instrumental in the transformation. They’ve built a charter school, offer all kinds of after school programs, and training for kids. The goal is to break the cycle of poverty for these families. The statistics show it is working.  The foundation not only supports the kids but also their families.

Food wine and fundraising

Well known chef, Harold Balink, is also a big supporter of the foundation and was the guest chef on Friday. He created a delicious four course meal and I helped select the wines to match. Chef Melissa Donahue lost her restaurant on Sanibel at the hands of Hurricane Ian. She was there as well and created the menu for the pre-dinner cocktail party.

Heights Foundation

Nope, this is not formal attire. Oops

I was also the emcee for the evening. Auctioneer Scott Robertson (pictured with me above) was in formal attire. I was too.  However, I slipped into flat sandals while loading my car with wine decanters and such. My intention was to change into my fancy shoes once I arrived at the event. It’s not uncommon for me to do.

Things were going well, my hair was cooperating, I was even running early. When I got out of the car to drop off the decanters. I looked down and remembered I needed to change my shoes. My shoes. Where are my shoes? They were sitting by my front door. I walked into the event in THESE. Hah. I went straight to the kitchen, dropped off the decanters and then out the back door. Back home to change. That was a first for me.

In the end it all worked out. The event was stunning, the food fantastic, and the attendees incredibly generous. Checkout some photos from the food wine and fundraising for The Heights Foundation.

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