Source: Chicago Tribune

The Saturday before Mother’s Day, for three years running, Tamar Manasseh has thrown a party. It’s on the corner of 75th Street and Stewart Avenue in Englewood. There’s a band. There’s a DJ. There’s a photo booth. There’s a whole lot of food.

Manasseh is the founder of Mothers/Men Against Senseless Killings, a 3-year-old group that sits watch and builds community in one of Chicago’s most violence-plagued neighborhoods — the neighborhood where Manasseh grew up. Volunteers gather in lawn chairs, talk, listen to music and serve as a block club of sorts. They’re out daily in the summer, and they take the fall, winter and spring months off. The Mother’s Day party is a bit of a “We’re back,” as well as a chance to honor moms on a holiday that, for many, is tinged by grief and loss.

This year, in addition to music and photos and food and friendship, there will be flowers.

Flowers for Dreams, a West Loop-based florist that donates 25 percent of its profits to a different charity each month, selected M.A.S.K. as its May charity.

“It made sense to really put them on a pedestal in May,” Flowers for Dreams co-founder and CEO Steven Dyme told me.

But here’s the really beautiful part. Also for May, Dyme’s shop offered customers a chance to buy a $15 bouquet to donate to a mom who has lost a child to gun violence, which Flowers for Dreams staffers will hand-deliver to Saturday’s party.

“It’s a chance to send a bouquet to a mother who may not have someone to send her flowers,” Dyme said. “I don’t want to overstate our impact. I’m sure it’s very little. But I think what flowers do really well is let you know someone cares. Some of the moms may not be getting a lot of those signs on a regular basis, so I think it’s kind of cool that we can let them know someone in the community cares.”

The bouquets, 80 of them, sold out in four hours.

Read the full story.

This is a story about the Community Safety and Peace strategy of the Partnership for Safe and Peaceful Communities.