Last year we left $15 gift cards to Dairy Queen for our host families with a thank you. I hope they appreciated them 🙂

We’ll be leaving a stitched tea towel and a jar of homemade preserves with $20 (because we are using their electricity). We do know the families we’ll be staying with this year. I’m looking forward to reading this forum and seeing what others do for host families. Thanks!

For the overnight stays with a host family, everyone chips in the amount they would have paid for shower service if the team uses their shower(s). Many host families refuse to accept the money so we put the money in an envelope with a note saying if they do not want or need the money then to donate it to their favorite charity. Some hosts supply food and drink and we make sure they are compensated for that too.

Great ideas. Many of he people who have hosted us over the years are still on our christmas card list. When we stay at a home, we will treat them to a meal, that we make, and clean up after. I’ll take a photo of them with us as a group, and send them a framed copy after the week. Also, I usually have the camera on the ready so I will often find a neat photo on the ride into their town, or on the way out that I might send them. I have never had anyone accept money from me. Also, in a lot of smaller town papers, thank notes in the paper are pretty nice also.

We give them a framed photo of the group, 2 custom pint glasses with our team logo on them and a signed thanked card

thank you card with cash

There is a non-profit in Tucson called Ben’s Bells. Their motto is “Be Kind”, we have done wind chimes from the organization because it all fits well.

https://bensbells.org/