Big Sunday happily welcomes you to Our Really Big Community Calendar.
We try to include all kinds of volunteering and helping opportunities for all kinds of interests, talents, passions, and ages! As you’ll see, these include volunteering opportunities (one-time and long-term) as well as the chance to support a nonprofit by attending fundraising events. Plus, of course, we include all of Big Sunday’s homegrown events, too! Whoever you are, and whatever you do, there is someone out there who could use your help.
If you have questions about our calendar, or would like to add a listing, please contact calendar@bigsunday.org or submit your event/opportunity via the button below.
Join Tree Musketeers in celebrating 30 years of youth-led environmental work in the South Bay and around the world. Lend a hand by planting and caring for trees along Imperial Highway in El Segundo!
Register through the Tree Musketeer website: https://treemusketeers.org/2017/arbor-day-is-on-its-way-2/
Instructor: Crescent Farm Staff
Learn about water conservation and sustainable gardening, with hands-on experience! The Crescent Farm, located in the heart of the Arboretum just west of Baldwin Lake, is a reclaimed landscape where we explore new and ancient horticulture techniques for water conservation and food production. This is an educational training series. Please bring gloves, drinking water; wear close-toed shoes and a hat.
March 11 – California Meadow
Spend a spring morning in a beautiful meadow at Crescent Farm! Last November we demonstrated how to plant a California-friendly wildflower meadow as a lawn alternative and in this workshop we explore its progression. Plant ID, habitat building and meadow maintenance will be discussed.
April 22 – Pollinators
Crescent Farm provides amazing habitat where our local fauna thrives. In the design and development phases of building Crescent Farm special consideration was given to plant selection and how these plants establish superior homes for native bees, birds and butterflies. Introducing pollinators into your yard adds interest, photo and learning opportunities for the whole family.
May 20 – Weaving / Basketry
Learn to use your bio-mass (plant waste) to create garden structures. Simple weaving techniques can use leaves as cordage, branches as trellises, tomato cages, shade shelters, and various long lasting leaves as weavers. Design and build compost structures, plant guards and soil traps in your own Crescent Garden.
June 17 – Crescent Farm Horticulture
Explore horticulture at Crescent Farm. Tour our choices for low water lawn alternatives, California native ethnobotanic plants of our local indigenous tribes, arid climate orchard trees and native wildflowers! Get ideas for your home landscape from our New California Landscape. Growing tips will also be discussed.
This year, Downtown Bookfest at Grand Park is partnering with the City of L.A. Department of Cultural Affairs' Big Read to celebrate the poetry of Emily Dickinson. The annual literary gathering highlights the work of L.A.-based writers and publishers with daylong readings, spoken word and activities featuring members of 826LA, Get Lit Players and others. You can catch performances by Mayda Del Valle, David Prather and Cut Chemist + Hymnal, take part in a book-making workshop inspired by Dickinson's collection of 400 plant specimens, pose for pictures in a Victorian-themed photo booth or write poems on vintage typewriters. And if you want to skip a trip to the bookstore, Red Hen Press, Skylight Books and Get Lit Publications will sell books and other souvenirs in pop-up bookshops. The event is free!
Oil Painting: Capture the Beauty of Nature
Saturdays, (6 week sessions):
January 14 – February 18
February 25 – April 1
April 8 – May 13
May 20 – June 24
1:00pm – 3:30pm
Ron Pettie, Instructor
$69 Arboretum members / $79 non-members (includes Arboretum admission)
All materials are included.
Capture the beauty of nature! The instructor will guide a beginner to draw and paint with confidence. More advanced students will be able to paint independently at their own pace and will be able to choose their own subjects.
Each subsequent six-week class will explore other areas of painting such as landscape, still life, domestic animals, structures, deserts, and seascapes. Master artist Ron Pettie will guide you on this adventure.
At the end of a six-week session students will learn the following:
- Composition styles
- How to read a color chart
- Color mixing
- How to use the grid system and the rule of thirds
- Use of dark and light values and gray scales
- Learn a variety of techniques for painting , including using different brushes and the palette knife for texture and depth
- How to use the magic frame on photographs
- Self-Critiquing – Standing back and squinting
- Choosing a signature
Reservations REQUIRED; To register please call the Education Department at 626-821-4623.
Be a Part of the Volunteer Usher Family!
More than 300 volunteer ushers assist South Coast Repertory by taking tickets, helping patrons to their seats, distributing programs and selling concession items and SCR merchandise. Volunteers see an entire season of theatre free-of-charge while mingling with theatregoers. The volunteer season concludes with a fun end-of-year usher celebration. For more info, please email usher@scr.org or call the Usher Hotline at 714-708-5068.
NOTE: This is an ONGOING volunteer opportunity. Please call for exact times and dates.
Enjoy meeting other people while helping others? Like to cook? If so, Project Angel Food needs you to help prepare healthy meals for the sick! The organization’s devoted volunteers of all ages represent the diversity of Los Angeles. They are at the heart of all Project Angel Food does, so they pride themselves on the strong sense of community amongst volunteers and staff alike.
Kitchen volunteers join a fun-loving group of compassionate people each day to do everything from chopping, stirring, mixing, baking and packaging meals. You don't even need to know how to cook … only how to take direction from their kitchen chefs. They could use your valuable help!
Two shifts are available: Monday – Friday: 8:00 am – 12:30 pm and 1:30 – 3:30 pm. A weekend shift on Sunday is also available from 8:00 am – 12:30 pm.
Please sign up HERE or contact Project Angel Food at volunteers@angelfood.org.
NOTE: This is an ONGOING weekly volunteer opportunity!
Everybody loves Big Sunday’s harbor cruises! Big Sunday invites lots of people of all ages, from all walks of life for a two-hour harbor cruise. Guests include individuals, families, corporate groups, faith groups, plus nice folks from group homes, hospitals, shelters – some of whom have never been on a boat before!
All participants are asked just one thing: to meet at least one new person. Then we all enjoy each other’s company and enjoy coffee, juice and awesome donuts, while watching the sea lions take in some sun. That’s it.
Big Sunday’s next cruise from Ports ‘o Call in San Pedro is on Sunday, March 12.
The cruise leaves at 10 am and returns at 12 pm.
We hope you can join us … after all, we’re all in the same boat!
Big Sunday Harbor Cruise
Cruises are always free. To sign up, contact beenish@bigsunday.org.
To help sponsor the “We’re All in the Same Boat” Project, contact adam@bigsunday.org.
Each Monday morning at 10 am, we host a fun, hands-on service project at Big Sunday headquarters called MM@10 (Monday Mornings at 10). It’s a great way for folks of all ages to get together to help others. Join us for all the fun!
To RSVP for upcoming MM@10 events, please contact beenish@bigsunday.org. Click HERE for MM@10’s full schedule.
Become a volunteer for Meals on Wheels West (MOW) Los Angeles and help deliver meals between 10:15 am and 12:30 pm any Monday – Friday! Student volunteers are always welcome at MOW. Younger students can help with various tasks in MOW’s office or be paired with one of their regular drivers or with a parent to help deliver food to clients. High school and college students who already are licensed drivers are especially appreciated as reinforcements to MOW’s regular corps of volunteers. MOW is happy to record your community service hours and send that information to your school.
NOTE: This is an ONGOING weekly volunteer opportunity!
The good folks at Hollywood HEART — a nonprofit dedicated to developing character strengths, confidence, and resiliency in at-risk youth through purposeful engagement in the arts — are in need of a few great volunteers!
Volunteers will be helping 36 amazing high school kids in varied grade levels ranging from 9th to 12th grades during the 6th period ICAP class at Los Angeles High School. The class, which covers a wearable art unit combining 3D sculpture, fashion, jewelry and more, is for enrolled LA High students interested in art. Volunteers are needed to help support the classroom teacher and the Hollywood HEART teaching artist by checking in supplies, encouraging student work and participation, and helping the teachers as necessary. It will be a fun, creative, and potentially messy class, so casual attire is encouraged.
NOTE: If volunteering on Monday, LAHS has a shortened schedule — 6th period is 2:27 – 3:07 pm. Tuesday through Friday 6th period is 2:11 pm – 3:07 pm. All volunteers must contact Hollywood HEART Director of Programs Maggie Blake at maggie@hollywoodheart.org to confirm scheduling and receive background check instructions.
