Submitted by Mary Spring
It all started with the idea of using up some extra wood in Don Spring’s workshop, but ended up spreading joy and helping The Table Soup Kitchen Foundation this Christmas. This is the story of the wooden trees.
On CBC television we watched the story of a man in Calgary who was making some extra money by building wooden trees and selling them to neighbours. We had some extra wood from one of Don’s pandemic workshop projects this fall, so Don decided to make some trees as well.
We took a picture of the wooden trees and invited interested folks to take a tree to decorate with their families. The trick was, however, that in order to have a wooden tree delivered to their home, they were asked to make a donation of any amount to The Table Soup Kitchen Foundation. Participants were asked to send us a photo of their decorated tree by December 21.
All of a sudden, Don’s workshop began to look like Santa’s workshop the week before Christmas. People connected, some ordering three trees, and they were delivered to homes on December 14.
The photographs began to arrive, as did the donations. One tree was delivered to Spruce Glen Public School where students in Kristin Higgs’ grade 7/8 class had collected food items for The Table. Over 1,800 food items were collected from the Spruce Glen community and delivered to The Table on December 18. Congratulations to those students.
Kristie Hobbs (left), Greg Tripp, and Kristin Higgs delivered food items collected by Spruce Glen to The Table (supplied)
A number of people decorated their trees with their grandchildren. Others included items from past Christmas seasons. Photographs, Christmas wrap, old Christmas cards, and ornaments were included. The time spent decorating the trees helped to make this holiday season special.
Mary Spring included photographs of her grandsons, one of which lives in Calgary and will not be in Huntsville for Christmas (supplied)
Jenny Kirkpatrick and her granddaughter Harper decorated their wooden tree (supplied)
Terri Howell and Kim DeLagran’s tree is called Memories. This tree includes an ornament that is over 90 years-old as well as a hand sewn dress from Terri’s great grandmother (supplied)
Terry and Linda Exell decorated their wooden tree with their grandchildren (supplied)
Many generous donations were delivered to The Table Soup Kitchen Foundation so that others will be able to enjoy a nice meal this holiday season.
Best of all, Don Spring’s workshop is less cluttered.
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