Volunteer Spotlight – Sam’s Journey from Newcomer to Friend at GiGi’s Playhouse

Meet Fun, Friends, Fitness Extraordinaire Volunteer Sam!

Sunny San Diego is a beautiful city that often draws in loads of new families, new residents and especially new volunteers. Many of these new comers are looking for meaningful activities such as volunteering and GiGi’s Playhouse San Diego is the perfect outlet!

Sam is one such of those awesome newbies to San Diego who happened to find GiGi’s and we are incredibly thankful he did!

We asked Sam to share some of his experience and thoughts on GiGi’s Playhouse San Diego and this is what he had to say:

“After moving to San Diego in March 2022, I was really eager to become part of the city’s community in a real and engaging way. I had tried a few one-off events through work, but they fell short of creating that human-to-human bond I was looking for.

Then, I learned about GiGi’s through one of my first San Diego friends Val Schlieder who frequents GiGi’s and dedicates her career and free time to helping others and building deep personal relationships. Val is always trying to get people involved, so it wasn’t long before she floated GiGi’s to me.

At first, I was intimated to volunteer at GiGi’s, I had zero experience with people who had Down syndrome and I felt I had nothing to offer. But in November 2022, I made my first appearance at GiGi’s Friends, Fun, and Fitness class. I was immediately humbled; the only experience I needed was bringing good energy and wanting to meet great new people. I would offer that advice to anyone looking to help out with GiGi’s or any other volunteering opportunity: just jump in!

The participants are only looking for new friends, someone to spend time with them laughing through class. That was exactly what I was looking for too, so it was a perfect match. I’ve made lifelong friends from GiGi’s already, and I’ve only just started.

My favorite thing about GiGi’s is all the friends I have made, seeing the same faces time after time and building on those friendships, and making new friends with every new member that walks in. With the Friends, Fun, and Fitness class specifically, the best part has to be the donkey kicks. There isn’t a stronger case of contagious laughter out there than being in a room full of enthusiastic donkey kickers.

If you are interested in becoming one of our awesomely fantastic volunteers like Sam, please visit us at: