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Masks result in $1,000 donation to South Cariboo Health Foundation

‘This is quite helpful for us’
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Brenda Devine (left) and Chris Nickless with the South Cariboo Health Foundation accept a $1,000 donation from Lorna Wiebe and Shelley Theriault. (Submitted photo)

A couple of local ladies donated $1,000 to the South Cariboo Health Foundation (SCHF) with the proceeds coming from a couple hundred masks they’d sewn and sold.

“We didn’t count them to tell you the honest truth,” says Lorna Wiebe. “We put them up at the Interlakes Market because when I went up there one day, I saw an employee wearing one. I had just started making some for friends and family.”

They asked if they could put them up by donation at the store and were told that of course they could.

Initially, they were offering them by donation but they ended up switching to asking $5 donations.

They’ve got about another 100 made again already, says Wiebe.

“We knew it was a need. COVID is not going away and as you watch the news, they say everybody needs to wear a mask on the ferries, on the busses and everything and we thought why not?

In addition to Wiebe, Shelley Theriault and Irene Jones helped make the masks.

They decided to donate to the South Cariboo Health Foundation because “we’re all getting older.”

“My husband had bladder cancer and has to use the hospital for that. It’s a need,” she says.

They’re planning to keep selling them until they run out of fabric, she says with a laugh.

“We’ve had to purchase the elastic ourselves but both Shelley and myself are quilters so we do have an abundance of fabric in our homes and we’ve been using our own fabric for this,” she says, “and of course our own thread and our machines and our time but that’s volunteer work and we do a lot of that around Deka Lake.”

They didn’t realize quite how much it was going to take off, says Brenda Devine, public relations and fundraising co-ordinator and consultant for the SCHF.

“I didn’t know we’d be getting this money but it’s really great,” she says. “Right now, there’s not a whole lot of fundraising, like the traditional style, so this is quite helpful for us and for somebody to take the time to be that kind and generous to us is quite nice. It’s really nice.”

They appreciate their dedication and hard work in sewing all the masks and giving the wonderful donation, she says.

“The foundation remains active in conjunction with the local hospital and we are still considering new purchases for their operations. As this year has been challenging we will still be planning for our annual Starry Nights campaign which starts in early November.”

Wiebe says they hope to donate again at Christmas time for Starry Nights.


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