Our Six Year Blur

In a million years, we would never have imagined that six years, to the day, after our first donation of pads and tampons to a local food pantry, we would be counting the items we've donated in the millions. It is just beyond ??????.

Thought it would be fun to share a few fun facts about how things got started:

That first donation was the result of a small-ish project Emma led that we called "Party at Our Pad." We invited family and friends to bring menstrual products to an open house, and we asked several other families to have events, too. The result was a collection that allowed nearly 200 families to leave the food pantry that day with a full year's supply! (Click here for more of the origin story.) Emma looks amazingly, exactly the same at age 21 as she did in this photo, when she was 15!

Before there was Girls Helping Girls. Period. there was Small Acts, which was simply a fun name Elise gave to the great volunteer work her children were doing, from the time they were, well... small.

Small Acts was inspired by Aesop's "No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted." Quinn loved teaching art to seniors for Small Acts; she also worked at sports clinics for developmentally disabled kids. And both girls worked at our local food pantry.

The Small Acts Facebook page details how #GirlsHelpingGirlsPeriod, a project, grew and grew and became its own thing.

So glad we have all of these old photos to remind us where we started! The end of that first distribution day was a milestone for us, and we were so proud of what Emma and Quinn started. Thanks for following along. If you'd like to get involved, there are many ways to help.

A version of this article first appeared on "The Spot," the Girls Helping Girls. Period. blog.