When she moved to Champaign 11 years ago, Ana Vieira knew nothing about hunger in the community.

She had never given it much thought back home in Portugal, and to her this university town seemed like "a piece of paradise."

Then she started volunteering for her church's food pantry, which works with Empty Tomb to deliver emergency food to families in crisis.

One day Vieira was sent to the home of a single mom with five young children. What she saw when she opened the door still brings her to tears.

There was no furniture in the house, just some blankets and towels on the floor. The baby was so thin his diaper hung off of him. One of the toddlers saw the bags of food in Vieira's arms and started jumping up and down, saying, "Today we're going to have dinner, we're going to have dinner."

"I'm never going to forget that," she said recently. "This is a university town, a town that produced many Nobel Prizes. There shouldn't be any families in the United States going through this."

Vieira heads a local group called FACET – Friends Against Children's Empty Tummies – which is raising money over the next few weeks to fight childhood hunger. The money will benefit the Eastern Illinois Food Bank's BackPack Program, which sends food home every weekend to schoolchildren at risk of going hungry.

The group hopes to raise at least $1,500 through a Sept. 9 silent art auction in downtown Champaign and a bake sale and basket raffle at the Sept. 11 farmer's market in Urbana.

It's the second year that FACET has raised money directly for the BackPack program. Initially, Vieira's group worked with Share Our Strength, a national organization that sponsors a "Great American Bake Sale" every year and redistributes the money to local anti-hunger organizations.

Vieira, who loves to bake, heard about the bake sale while on maternity leave several years ago. She formed a team with friends, created FACET and entered the contest, hoping to raise $500. They took in $1,300. The second year they raised $1,500.

Then Vieira's pastor at St. Matthew Lutheran Church in Urbana told her about the BackPack Program, and she decided to give the money directly to the food bank, which had previously received grants from Share Our Strength.

"It's been a great partnership," she said.

The bake sale will feature gourmet items, including chocolate truffles, pepperoni bread (made by Vieira), marinara sauce (made by her husband Mauricio, who is Italian by descent) and krumkake, Norwegian cookies.

The 13 raffle baskets are filled with merchandise and gift certificates donated by local merchants, including concert tickets from WIXY, an exercise bag full of gear from the Mettler Center, and two massage packages from Elements of Design spa/salon in Urbana.

Raffle tickets will be sold from 7 a.m. to noon this Saturday at the food bank's booth at the Urbana Market at the Square, Vieira said. They will also be available at the market on Sept. 11 up until the time of the drawing, at 11:30 a.m., and at the Sept. 9 art auction. Or you can contact Vieira by email at: teamfacet@gmail.com.

Local artist Danielle Miller donated a painting for the auction, scheduled for 6 to 9 p.m. Sept. 9 at Indi Go Artist Co-op, 9 E. University Ave., C. Admission is free. Other artwork by Miller will also be on display.

The goal is to sponsor enough backpacks to feed 10 to 15 children for an entire school year, she said. Thrivent Financial will match half of whatever the group raises up to $750, and Commerce Bank donated $150.

The BackPack Program will feed 425 children this year in Champaign-Urbana and surrounding communities, said food bank spokeswoman Cheryl Precious.

She said Vieira is "a testament to how one person can make a huge difference. She's been able to pull together so many people and so many organizations and make this a big success."

Vieira came to the UI for postdoctoral work in animal sciences/reproductive biology, and now works as a senior technician in a biology lab on campus. Her husband, a former UI graduate student in neuroendocrinology, plans to start seminary school in Chicago this fall.

The whole family has embraced the anti-hunger campaign. Her two sons, ages 5 and 7, will work alongside her at the farmer's market on Sept. 11.

Vieira chokes up as she talks about children who go to bed worrying whether they will eat the next day.

"It shouldn't happen," she said. "The grownups, we are the ones responsible for them. As long as I have my army of volunteers, we'll do this every year."