As I have mentioned, writing for the paper pays basically nothing, but it’s part of why I know so much about the community. We get stories different ways and this is a case of someone coming to the paper to ask if we could cover it. That was last year and the event is now an annual one.

We only have a few nice assisted living places in town and the fancy one (with applicable high costs) is appropriately name The Palace. Not surprisingly, they have a wide variety of activities for the residents.  Also not surprisingly, they include arts and crafts sessions.  While the residents enjoy that, many of them were quite active in the community in their younger time. The instructor, who has been teaching at this and other facilities owned by the same company for ten years, came up with the idea of the residents at the Palace should sell their items and use the money for a back-to-school contribution. They all loved the idea, but how to actually do it was the question. Enter one of the local individuals who is involved in many different non-profits, to include one he established specifically to support things for children. He and a couple of others set up sales events around town as well as on-line sales opportunities. Then he reached out to a couple of other non-profits to help select twenty children as recipients.

The children and family (or usually a parent) come to the Palace for a luncheon, meet the residents, and are presented with an electronic tablet and a backpack filled with school supplies. The food at the Palace is one of the things residents pay for, but in this case, they make it a kid-type lunch which probably also brings back memories for the residents. The twenty residents who created items this past year (actually twenty-two as two passed away before the event) are planning to keep with it for the coming year.