Coleville kids shop fast and furiously at Santa’s Hut!
By Joan Janzen
joanjanzen@yahoo.com
Every year kids look forward to visiting a Santa’s Hut in their community. It’s a place where they can shop for affordable gifts for their families and experience the joy of giving to others. The gifts are specially priced for children, which is possible because of all the monetary donations and donations of gift items that Santa’s Hut receives. In addition, all the proceeds from the event go to the West Central Crisis Centre to help run their programs and services.
However, this year, many communities were unable to make their Santa’s Hut available. Nevertheless, on Saturday, December 12th, the community of Coleville opened the doors to their Santa’s Hut for the children from Coleville and surrounding community.
Joleen Scheible, who organized the event, explained how this was possible. “We have such a small community of kids, so we can still have ours. I have the kids shopping on a schedule, so we have the right amount of kids. Other communities have so many kids; we’re super lucky.”
Every child is allowed a maximum of twenty minutes to shop, and the schedule was posted before the event. “Every kid in town was on the schedule,” Joleen said. Children up to age 14 were eligible, and of course, children that aren’t school aged could sign up.
“I made the decision to make it available only to Coleville kids this year,” Joleen said, which ensured their Santa’s Hut could accommodate the right amount of children.
“Normally, we have it at the school, but because of Sunwest’s protocol, we’re not allowed people from outside of the school, so I asked the Legion if we could have it there,” Joleen explained.
The Legion not only donated their rental fee but let the group set up the night before and asked if they needed volunteers.
“I also have two volunteers - Santa and a local photographer, Hailly Nicklom Photography, who offered Santa photos. The Santa photos don’t cost anything, just a donation. Hailly is a local resident who contacted Joleen and asked if she could offer her services out of the goodness of her heart. “Normally, we have Santa come to the school Christmas concert, but that’s not happening this year.”
This is Joleen’s fifth year to organize Santa’s Hut in Coleville. Joleen said, “This is a fun thing. The kids love it. A kid in grade 1 was telling me every day for three weeks how excited he was about Santa’s Hut. Kids are so funny. It’s going to be more fun because Santa will be there. And they get treats. The volunteers dress up and make it as fun as possible. I think I have more fun than the kids.”
When the doors to Santa’s Hut opened, the children didn’t waste any time making their selections. “It was fast and furious!” Joleen said. “We had 38 kids go through the door. We started at 11:00 a.m. and were home by 2:00 p.m.! We raised $1,086.00 for the Crisis Centre, and I’m pretty sure that’s our best year so far. It was awesome, chaotic, exciting and exhausting all at once!”
