Wow, Christmas is just around the corner again, seems time is going by faster these day because we are all busy with friends and family and work and school and it just doesn’t stop. But now I see houses lit up for the holiday and it actually takes me back in time to when I was a child and the annual flipping through the Sears catalog or the Canadian Tire catalogs with my brother and sisters circling the items I wished for and marking the pages to be sure our parents noticed. Of course we knew there was no chance in getting all of them but maybe a chance for one of them, so we made sure they had plenty of options. It did not matter in the end when we finally woke up Christmas morning to a tree stuffed with toys and things for all of six of us, we were just happy to be together and thrilled to get whatever was wrapped under there.
Sparky, Optimist President Ralph Brunton, Captain James McDonald
It never occurred to us young ones that there were families who could not enjoy the holidays as much as we did, and the older we got the more we realized there are some people who need a helping hand, so as a family we always tried to help someone every year, we missed some years but not many. Some years it was toys for another families children and some years it was food. As we all grew up started our own families we kept the tradition going by giving during the Holidays.
The Optimist Toy drive is one way you can help a family in need. Visit the Toy Drive section of this website and see how you can help and you will also find a list of local businesses and schools who are distributing Angels that will provide a new unwrapped toy for our cause. This year we will try to collect 3000 toys for the roughly 1500 children that will need our help. With the help of the great citizens of Cornwall and Sparky’s Toy Drive with the Cornwall Professional Fire Fighters Association, we will meet our goal.