‘TWAS THE WEEK BEFORE——
By Lion Mary Frances Gosnell, Chair
Although the TimeLine chronicled activity of the Holiday Giving Project for two months previously, the week before, activity started gearing up! Warm accessories of hats, mittens, gloves, socks and scarves decorated the Christmas Tree at the Lions Holiday Dinner Party as well as bags of Stocking Stuffers were piled around. The Christmas Party Room at the Damascus UM Church took a turn on Wednesday of a food storage warehouse as teams of Lions with truck loads of food emptied their collections along the wall waiting for the Lion Sorters to arrive that evening. Once all was sorted, the “grocery store” was neatly stocked. Thursday, the room was transformed into a service desk at a clothing store while wrappers were at work with an outfit for each of the 87 children being packaged.
Then we had the opportunity to shop for the warm accessories for each family as well as other small gifts. Others Lions were packing their team’s food boxes and helping to package fruit and other items. On Friday suddenly appeared a bag of toys for each family and two bicycles. Red stockings were stuffed by our Leo President and put in a laundry basket which had paper supplies for each family. The room was getting readied for delivery when two sleighs pulled up, unloaded their wares which was a beautifully decorated box of homemade cookies and breads for each family. Now we are ready for the delivery! Oh, we need to get the perishables early in the morning!
Ten teams of Lions, Scouts, Family and Friends delivered the food and gifts, – 4 boxes, two large bags and a laundry basket – to each of the 30 families consisting of 72 adults and 87 children. It took 55 people plus the Tradesmen Motorcycle Club members giving of an estimate of 375 man-hours to pull this project together and deliver it. The cost of $4000 does not take into consideration the toys, 2 per child and a family gift that were donated by the Tradesmen Motorcycle Club, the warm accessories and the stocking stuffers donated by the Lions and the Scouts, the 3 dozen cookies per family baked by the Goldstein Family and the toothbrushes donated by Drs. To and Rajani.
To name all those who assisted/ worked on the project would be difficult and I would be amiss if I missed any of those who worked so diligently to make it all happen. But I will say that Partners-In-Service were of a great asset in making it all come together. You know who you are. Thank You from all of us! Thanks to the Key Persons who chaired a portion of the project and thanks to all the Lions, Boy Scouts, other family members and friends for your help and support. The teams came back with some precious stories of their deliveries!
The Holiday Fund Team has been working the businesses for donations and passing the “jar” at meetings. The monetary response has been good!
Thanks to all who helped make Christmas a bit brighter for a lot of families of our area!