Ethan & Choco's Book Club

Striving to make access to books and reading a core part of the care that kids receive in the hospital, with the premise that literacy support for children fighting cancer and other life-altering conditions can help promote cognitive health and social connections that are part of thriving through treatment and beyond

Category Archives: Thank you!


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THANK YOU BOOK IT 2022 SUPPORTERS!

A HUGE THANK YOU to everyone who supported ECBC’s BOOK IT 2022 Virtual Run and Book Drive by “running” 5, donating 5, creating a fundraising team, and/or sharing on social media. Together, 123 donors raised $25,000. While this is only half of our fundraising goal, we knew this goal was ambitious yet hopeful, reflecting the increased costs of our growing book and reading programs at CHOC Children’s Hospital. The BOOK IT donation site is still up and open for donations if you haven’t had a chance to contribute (runsignup.com/BOOKIT2022), though there will be no more explicit monetary pushes for BOOK IT until 2023. We will immediately be turning to outreach for our Halloween book drive (for which we need approximately 600 new books), and we are hopeful that a strong response in the form of direct book donations will minimize book purchases and thus the cash output towards our Halloween event. 

I would like to extend a super special thank you to our top donors and fundraising teams. Thank you to our top fundraisers Mary Kay Viscounty, Susie Alexander, and Dr. Van Huynh (as well as ECBC Co-Founder Ethan)… We are so grateful for your personal efforts to rally others behind our cause. A tremendous thank you also to our top individual “$500 and above” donors: Tod and Sharon Paris, Keith and Katherine Dunleavy, Kevin Kodzis, CHOC Hyundai Cancer Institute, Sur West Homes, Shameeron Paur, Rob and Brooke Lieberman, Molly Cronin, Tootie Nienow, Erin and Jeff Denes, Susie Alexander, Tracy and Jeremy Stahl, the Antonius family, and an ongoing ECBC friend and advocate who wishes to remain anonymous but deserves mention being our very top donor (this year and every year prior!). Together, this mighty group was vital to the success of this campaign, having contributed more than 60% of the total funds raised. Finally, a special shout out to Jack Carlisle/The Potting Shed and Fenny Kokenge/Fenny’s Flowers as well as Dori Renn/Cirkel Fitness for hosting your own events in the community (Houseplants 101, DIY succulents, yoga class) to raise awareness and funds for BOOK IT! And of course, thank you to the ECBC Board of Directors for all their efforts and commitment to keep ECBC going.

Thank you everyone for supporting ECBC during this especially difficult time to be a super tiny nonprofit. Your donations allow ECBC to keep helping hospitalized kids to thrive through treatment with books and reading — which is a powerful contributor to cognitive health and thus general wellness and thrivership. 

Please stay connected with ECBC by following us on our website (ethanandchocosbookclub.com) or on Facebook/Instagram (@ethanandchocosbookclub). And save the date for BOOKIT 2023, hopefully in-person — Monday, September 4. 

With deepest gratitude,

Ali, Ethan and the ECBC Team

* Please know that 100% of funds and books raised go to ECBC operating and program costs — ECBC has no employees and I take no salary.

Click image above for donation site.


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THANK YOU Hicks Canyon!

THANK YOU Hicks Canyon Elementary families for the 83 books that you purchased for ECBC at your book fair this past week! We appreciate your support so much, and we can’t wait to get all these great books to patients at CHOC Children’s Hospital! A special shout out to Tina Jussal for your making this happen despite such short notice!


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THANK YOU Baum Squad!

A HUGE thank you to Baum Ortho for this amazing donation of 160 new books! Baum families who donated, you did a terrific job at picking out highly popular titles and so much variety — we received books in every book type category! We are so very grateful for ECBC’s ongoing partnership with Baum Ortho. It makes a big difference for us to have these awesome books coming in regularly, which go right to oncology and other patients at CHOC Children’s Hospital!


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THANK YOU Olga!

How awesome is this?! In honor of Childhood Cancer Awareness Month and Hispanic Heritage Month, Olga Hernandez conducted a Spanish-language book drive amongst her family and friends. She just delivered 86 terrific new Spanish books, bookplated with her donors’ names and ready to be delivered to kids at CHOC! This is super helpful, as we are constantly in need of Spanish-language books, yet we rarely have any in our inventory. THANK YOU so very much, Olga! for taking this on and helping us in this much needed way! And thank you Fenny Meyling Kokenge for connecting ECBC with yet another amazing supporter!

Ogla’s helper Waffles signed the bookplates of anonymous donations!


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THANK YOU to these amazing 7th graders!

A HUGE thank you to these eight (one is missing from photo) seventh graders at Grace Lutheran School in Huntington Beach for choosing ECBC for their service spring project for a second year in a row! They ran a terrific school-wide book drive, including hosting a book donation table for a week+ before and after school, making flyers and book collection boxes, creating their own promotional video/commercial to share online, and sorting/counting all of the books. In sum, they collected a total of 217 new books for kids of all ages, which is especially impressive given this school’s super small student population. Also, a huge shout out to Joi Vutpakdi for rallying the kids behind our cause as well as all of her work to help the kids make their book drive a success. And of course, thank you to all the Grace Lutheran families for all of your generous book donations. THANK YOU GRACE LUTHERAN!


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THANK YOU HEWES MIDDLE SCHOOL!

Thank you Hewes Highlanders for your wonderful donation of 235 books — which included books in every category that we need from board books and picture books to beginning readers and chapter books to nonfiction, graphic novels, novels for teens, poetry, and Spanish language books. A special shout out to Mrs Turner’s class for collecting the most books and winning the donut party!

It is worth noting that this is the FIRST book drive we’ve had in the seven years we’ve been doing this that the number of books that we count (and re-count) on our end is HIGHER than the number of books we were told by the group! Also, we only had to exclude ONE book that was clearly used, BY FAR the fewest % of used books we’ve received in a school donation. ASB, you must have done an awesome job communicating in your class presentations the importance of new books only!

THANK YOU Hewes Leadership class for organizing this effort, Mr. Jennings for rallying your class behind our cause and all your work behind the scenes, and the Hewes Community for helping ECBC to provide books and reading for Orange County’s hospitalized kids!


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THANK YOU KRISTIN AND STUDIO 17!

A HUGE thank you to Kristin Chahbazian/Studio 17 for her super generous donation to ECBC! Recently, Kristin hosted a book drive at her Tustin-based salon where she asked her clients to donate books in lieu of giving her a monetary tip. Her amazing clients donated a total of 91 new books — mostly all popular, high-interest titles! What an amazing way to inspire community to support our cause — by turning her usual monetary tips into books for kids at CHOC Children’s Hospital! We are so very grateful for Kristin’s philanthropic heart!


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THANK YOU Baum Squad!

A HUGE THANK YOU to Dr. Baum and Baum Squad patients for collecting books for Ethan & Choco’s Book Club! We are so happy to partnering with you again and for your ongoing support…it makes a big difference for us to have these awesome books coming in regularly, which go right to oncology and other patients at CHOC Children’s Hospital!


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THANK YOU Thrive Buddies!

Thank you to Elise Joseph and her friends for dedicating your last book club meeting to being Thrive Buddies for kids at CHOC who are recently diagnosed with cancer. Each of your book-inspired artwork and Thrive Buddy postcard will go in a Read Think Thrive Bag to inspire new oncology warriors to read and respond creatively to a fun book — which helps contribute to cognitive health and thrivership through treatment!  THANK YOU GIRLS, and thank you for each donating a copy of the book!  If others would like to involve their youth groups (i.e., classrooms, book clubs, Girl Scouts) in this activity, please e-mail at Ali@ECbookclub.com and we will provide instruction/materials.


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MOST AWESOME School Donation To Date!

A HUGE thank you to Rossmoor Elementary School for donating 531 NEW BOOKS to Ethan & Choco’s Book Club! This terrific school has a Harry Potter style house system for Knights — where the four Knight houses are engaged in friendly competition in academic and non-academic areas throughout the year, including philanthropic support of the community. What a wonderful way to create school community and motivate students! ECBC was so fortunate to be the recipient of their most recent community outreach project, where donation boxes were put out at the school for each of the Knight houses, and students purchased books to contribute by either ordering off an ECBC-provided Amazon wish list or buying books at their school book fair. We are blown away by the response, which amounts to the largest single book donation from a school that we have received and will provide 2-3 months of books for our inpatient and outpatient programs at CHOC Children’s Hospital. Congrats to House of Lancelot for contributing the most books at more than 200 new books donated!

THANK YOU Rossmoor families for rallying behind our cause. Thank you also to Kristin Moushon for thinking of ECBC and connecting us with your school. And, a special thank you to Rossmoor Principal Amy Coltey for your commitment to making community outreach part of your school’s culture and for all you did to make this book drive a great success! Go Knights!


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Thank you Guin Foss Elementary School!

THANK YOU Guin Foss Elementary for donating to ECBC last week at your book fair. We appreciate your support so much, and we can’t wait to get all these great books to patients at CHOC Children’s Hospital! A special shout out to Susie Alexander for your help organizing the book drive!


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THANK YOU Tarbut V’Torah for ANOTHER Amazing Book Drive!

Thank you TVT Lower School for hosting a book drive for ECBC again this year alongisde your school book fair! The book drive was a great success, with TVT students donating 266 terrific new books spanning all of the categories we need and including many high-demand titles. Thank you to the 5th graders for their hard work in promoting the book drive, and thank you to the team of parents who helped to coordinate it (Nuriya Ismagilova, Galina Kerenskaya, Christine Groner, Jessica Ardo, Andrea Katz). And a special thank you to TVT student and Leukemia survivor Liam Katz for delivering the books to us again this year!

We are so grateful for TVT for their annual support since ECBC’s first year of bookraising in 2016. Each year they have held tremendous book drives that are promoted by the students and that result in 200+ books — having raised well over 1000 books over the past five years. THANK YOU TVT for continuing to be a thrive partner school and being such an amazing model for how kids and schools can make a difference for other kids in our community!

 


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THANK YOU Grace Lutheran School!

A HUGE thank you to Grace Lutheran School for their donation of 200 new, fantastic books of all types, ranging from board books to picture books and chapter books to informational texts, graphic novels and teen literature. ECBC is especially grateful for the hard work of these 6th grade boys, who organized and conducted the school-wide book drive as their spring service project. The boys made flyers to distribute to school families, created their own video/commercial to share with all of the classes, made book collection boxes, ran book collection tables for the 12 day that they held the book drive. This is the first (and only) book donation that we received from a school during the 2020-2021 school year, so we are deeply appreciative. Thank you Grace Lutheran and especially this crew of terrific boys!.


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Thank you Baum Orthodontics!

A HUGE thank you to Baum Orthodontics and patients for this totally awesome donation of almost 300 new books of ALL types, from board books and picture books to graphic novels and awesome nonfiction! A fantastic first donation of the year!! These will provide most of what we need for our donations this Friday to CHOC’s Outpatient Infusion Center and also to CHOC’s Oncology clinic. We appreciate your support so much, and boy does it make a difference right now!


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BOO-ks for Treats Delivered!

Today ECBC delivered 200 bags of Halloween “BOO-KS for Treats” (500 books) to CHOC Children’s Hospital for their reverse trick-or-treating event on Friday. We delivered another 100 books to CHOC’s Outpatient Infusion for our library cart, so that kids coming in for infusions will also receive Halloween books. We will miss participating in CHOC’s usual trick-or-treating event but we are so happy to be able to contribute to CHOC’s Halloween celebration this year. A big THANK YOU to everyone who donated Halloween-themed books, and a huge thank you to Behr Paint for conducting a corporate book drive and donating about 115 of the books. And, a special thank you to the Antonius Family, Bill and Royce Bellaty, Enderle Center, Fenny’s Flowers, Peter Royston, and the Stahl Family for your BOOK IT2020 donations that were allocated specifically to funding Halloween books — your donations were used to purchase the remainder of the books that we needed for this event (all book-plated with you names on them). Finally, thank you to our awesome Board members and Programs Committee Mary Kay Viscounty, Sandy Tweedt, and Anne Case for your help in coordinating the Behr book drive and assembling all supplies!


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ECBC’s First Mega Book Bag Packaging Day is in the Books!

Yesterday ECBC had its first Read Think Thrive (RTT) Bag Mega Packaging Day, where 120 of our book bags were packaged by teen Girl Scouts so they could be delivered to CHOC Children’s Hospital next week. These bags contain ten new, high-quality books curated by the age and gender of the recipient, along with new art supplies (crayons, colored pencils, markers, paints, clay), various mediums for literature-based creative projects, and miscellaneous items including bookmarks, reading lights, and care cards with personal messages from youth volunteers. With their delivery to CHOC next week, this will be the first time that ECBC will have a supply of RTT Bags on site at the hospital, which (with the help of amazing CHOC staff) will allow us to finally accomplish our goal to get a book bag to EVERY new cancer diagnosis at CHOC.

THANK YOU to the awesome girls in Troop #2695 and Troop #3115 for the prep work you did leading up to the event we well as for your hard work yesterday! And, a HUGE shout out to 14-year old Girl Scout Senior Abigail Tweedt and Troop 2695 leader Sandy Tweedt: Abigail for your tremendous leadership and work you did leading up to packaging day, and Sandy for leading girls in the Silver Project (under especially difficult circumstances given Covid restrictions) and your invaluable ongoing commitment to ECBC. This day could not have happened without you!


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Thank You Evan!

A HUGE shout out to Foothill High School senior Evan Antonius for the awesome boxes of books you delivered last night! Evan conducted his own BOOK IT book drive, collecting books that we are asking for on our Amazon BOOK IT 2020 wish list, so they are all high-quality books that ECBC needs for specific programs and patients. Evan has also been holding his own fundraiser on our virtual BOOK IT campaign website, and he’s almost 2/3 of the way to his fundraising goal. THANK YOU Evan for taking the initiative to support reading for hospitalized kids, many of whom are battling cancer. We appreciate you so much! To support Evan’s fundraising efforts, go to: https://runsignup.com/Race/53767/Donate/h2mGILClkH4yt4eG


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Thank you NCL and Fidelity!

A HUGE thank you to National Charity League’s North Tustin chapter for the 172 books that they donated, which were collected as part of their Tea and Fashion Show! And, another huge thank you to Fidelity National for the 150 books and wagon that they just donated as a result of the book drive they held in their office in the month of February. Both book drives used ECBC’s Amazon wish lists and yielded all high-quality titles that will be put to immediate use in our programs at CHOC Children’s Hospital. THANK YOU NCL and Fidelity, we SO appreciate your support! And thank you April Anderson and Makayla Turner for taking the lead in organizing these efforts!!

Fidelity National’s February Book Drive
NCL North Tustin’s book drive


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A Long Overdue Holiday Thank You!

A HUGE, long overdue THANK YOU to Mary Kay Viscounty and Perry Viscounty for collecting books rather than hostess gifts at your Christmas party in December. 100 terrific new books, plus a stash of Amazon gift cards. THANK YOU! We SO appreciate that you rallied your guests to support reading for kids at CHOC Children’s Hospital! And thank you to everyone who contributed!