TEMPLE, Texas — Thanksgiving is less than a week away and some local food pantry shelves are bare.
So LaRay Garibay and her family decided to step in and help get more food out to families ahead of the holidays.
"We're building baskets basically for families who can't necessarily afford all of it or have to decide between paying a bill or Thanksgiving dinner. Even if they are getting assistance, you can't splurge it all on Thanksgiving dinner. We're just trying to take the edge off to help parents be able to get presents for the kids for Christmas," Garibay explained.
The Garibay family opened up their home garage to food donations from the community and their neighbors who also help make the food boxes to give to families in need.
Garibay says the community have welcomed her, her husband, and her children with open arms since they moved to their Temple neighborhood.
"The community just gathered around us. They barely even knew us when we first moved here and they supported us from the get-go. They didn't even know me and they would just drop off stuff," Garibay continued.
With food prices in grocery stores skyrocketing, Garibay felt this was the best time to get as much help as they could and donate their food boxes to as many families as they could.
LaRay's husband is an active duty military member so the family will be deployed to another state soon
However, she is passing the food donating torch to her neighbor Nicole Skalos, who says the foundation of their community is strong and they're prepared to keep the giving going
"I'm going to make sure we keep going and keep helping our community and making sure that everybody can stay healthy. We have to keep it going. We really are a very close community," Skalos said.
The Garibay family may not be in Temple for long, but they plan to continue their giving efforts wherever they'll be next.
To support local food pantries, information can be found here.