By Special to the Town Crier

“Tuffets for Tots,” a first-time fund-raiser to support Ronald McDonald House at Stanford, raised $11,000 with the sale of donated children’s furniture at the Palo Alto Festival of the Arts back in August.

The furniture, donated by IKEA, was decorated by artists in their own style and displayed in the Ronald McDonald House booth during the annual juried art event. Festival attendees bought approximately 100 of the one-of-a-kind furnishings, with all proceeds benefiting Ronald McDonald House at Stanford.

The house provides a home away from home for the families of children undergoing treatment for life-threatening illnesses at nearby Lucile Salter Packard Children’s Hospital or Stanford Medical Center.

“We did fabulously,” said Honey Meir-Levi, executive director of Ronald McDonald House at Stanford. “The thing incredibly touching was the work artists did. Some of (the work was) very child oriented, some very sophisticated - a lot of top-notch work. It was a touching feeling where everybody does what they love.”

More than 90 artists from the Bay Area to Los Angeles participated in designing children’s furniture for “Tuffets for Tots,” including folk singer Joan Baez. Ronald McDonald House at Stanford, located at 520 Sand Hill Road in Palo Alto, is a non-profit organization. Built in 1979, the original house had 13 bedrooms and one employee.

In 1992, in response to the increasing needs of families, it was expanded to include 24 bedrooms in three wings. Today the house serves more than 1,000 families annually, and further expansion is planned.

Meir-Levi said families are charged only $10 a night to stay at the house, and no family is ever turned away because of an inability to pay.

A board of directors, many of them from Los Altos and Los Altos Hills, heads the house program.

For more information about Ronald McDonald House at Stanford’s events and volunteer opportunities, logon to www.ronaldhouse-stanford.org or call 325-5113.