Evan’s Monumental Gifts Bringing Holiday Hope to Local Foster Families

That first Christmas without Evan, the Bollinger family bought a bunch of toys and Christmas gifts and took them to his grave where they sat in the snow.

“That first year was the hardest. We didn’t know how to handle not having him,” said Kiara Bollinger, mother of Evan and founder of Evan’s Monumental Gifts.

Bollinger did not want any family to feel the pit of loneliness that her family felt during the unexpected loss of a child, so Kiara and her husband Eric decided to take their grief and channel it into helping other families.

In 2018, the Bollingers were expecting their second child. They had already picked out a name: Evan. The couple and family were so excited to bring Evan into this world, but an unexpected turn of events changed the Bollinger’s lives forever. Three months into her pregnancy, the Bollingers discovered that Evan had Holoprosencephaly, which means his brain did not divide properly. After genetic testing, it was discovered that it was caused by an extra chromosome number 13. Trisomy 13. The Bollingers decided to continue the pregnancy and have any moments possible with Evan. He was born on Jan 7, 2019, and for one week until his death, the Bollingers spent time with Evan and held onto hope that medical intervention would save their son.

Because of the struggles the Bollingers faced alone such as buying a headstone and burial plot instead of a crib, they wanted to help others in the same situation and founded Evan’s Monumental Gifts.

In addition to the non-profit they run, they host an annual holiday drive. This year’s drive is a toy drive that will benefit foster children of Lawrence and Beaver counties. There are about 50 bins in local businesses in the area where toys can be donated until December 10.

“I want to be able to place a toy in hands of as many children as I can this year, with the help of the generous people of Ellwood,” Kiara said. “We want to help as many families as we can. We need to collect as much as we can.”

Kiara said since they started the holiday drive four years ago, the support has continued to grow.

She said the first year they helped Akron Children’s Hospital by donating 500 toys and a few different area Arby’s and Dollar General Stores allowed the Bollingers to put bins at their locations. The second year they collected baby items for New Beginnings Pregnancy Center. The third year they collected more than 1,000 toys and other supplies for the Ronald McDonald House.

The Bollingers hope to collect even more toys this year (donation locations are featured in the image gallery).

In addition to donating a toy, Kiara hopes that community members might also consider a donation to Evan’s Monumental Gifts in order to continue to help grieving parents feel like they have support behind them.

“The community has been so amazing, and I’m so glad to be here and able to help,” Kiara said. “It helps me to help others in my grief with the non-profit. It’s needed, and I really didn’t know how much of a need there was for it.”

Kiara said the organization has helped seven families since August.

“Many have had stillborn babies,” she said. “I love how the community has been referring people to me. They know they don’t have to beg people for money. We sold t-shirts to pay for our son’s headstone. If there was an organization like this, we might not have had to struggle.”

You can follow Evan’s Monumental Gifts on Facebook and check out the website.