St. Marys residents ‘Pull Up a Chair’ for Giving Tuesday

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The generosity and artistic creativity of St. Marys and area residents will be on full display on Giving Tuesday Nov. 29 after being asked to “Pull Up a Chair” in support of monthly community dinners at St. Marys United Church.

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For this year’s community wide display of generosity, the St. Marys Giving Tuesday committee invited locals to paint, refinish or decorate donated chairs that will be auctioned off through both a silent and live auction at St. Marys United Church Nov. 29 from 6-8 p.m.

Though the idea was simple, committee co-chair Cindy Taylor said the response both from those who donated chairs and those who painted, refinished or decorated them was almost overwhelming.

“This is the first time the committee decided to do this,” Taylor said. “We started the Giving Tuesday civic movement in St. Marys six years ago and normally we just approached individual businesses, schools and social groups to take part however they saw fit, whether it’s putting out a donation box, collecting food, collecting clothing, that sort of thing.

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“We’re still doing that this year, but on top of that we came up with an idea that could sort of bring the whole community together.”

Using the friendly and welcoming tagline, “Pull Up a Chair,” the committee put a call out for old chairs people might have lying around that they’d be willing to donate to the initiative, and the community came through, donating 100 chairs ranging from your run-of-the-mill wooden kitchen-table chairs to some that would seem more at home in a high-end antique shop.

“Then we thought, ‘Are we going to get enough people who are going to be interested in decorating these chairs?’ So we put it out to anyone interested in painting or refinishing or decorating the chairs — anything goes — and the response was amazing.”

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Despite the need to foot the bill for supplies and the time commitment necessary to decorate them, all 100 chairs went out into the community and were returned for auction as true works of art.

After learning about Pull Up a Chair, Nancy Wojcik, a grades three and four teacher at Holy Name of Mary School, decided she would pick up two chairs for her students to decorate so they could give back to the community on Giving Tuesday. After picking out the chairs and bringing them home, her daughter, a Grade 8 student at Holy Name of Mary School, decided she wanted a chair to decorate herself, so they went back and picked up another one.

Ultimately, the whole Grade 8 class decided to get in on the fun and, as a group, they decorated and painted six more chairs for the fundraiser auction.

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“The students are so excited to come and have their parents see their chairs,” Wojcik said. “I wouldn’t take pictures of the final products because I’m trying to get the parents to come to the auction. … They were just so excited. They had to all choose a design, and then they narrowed it down and voted on which child’s design would be used, and then they all took a turn painting the chair.”

The Holy Name of Mary School students, as well as those from Little Falls Public School, and their parents will also be making baked goods to sell at the auction on Tuesday. In addition, Barista’s and Snapping Turtle Coffee Roasters will be on hand with hot beverages, takeaway meals will be available from chef Chris Campbell and Sunset Diner food trucks with proceeds going to charity, and members of the St. Marys DCVI bands will offer musical entertainment during the auctions, with the live auction to be led by celebrity auctioneer Mayor Al Strathdee.

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All money raised through the auction will go to supporting the free community dinners held at St. Marys United Church by a different group, club, business or organization each month.

“Community dinners make a perfect sort of tie in to Pull Up a Chair,” Taylor said. ” … Every month, someone new takes over this dinner and when they do that, they pay for the food and they get the volunteers to serve it, make it, all of those things. Sometimes it’s a challenge to find organizers for all 12 months, so we said, ‘Let’s use the money to pay for these community dinners.’

” … One-hundred per cent of the sales of all these chairs will go to the community dinners.”

To see all of the chairs that will be up for auction on Tuesday, many of which have been on display in the front windows of local businesses, visit st-marys-pull-up-a-chair.myshopify.com.

gsimmons@postmedia.com