If you’re taking in the Winkler Harvest Festival’s parade this Saturday morning, be sure to bring some cash for the boot.
Winkler Fire Department members will be walking alongside the fire trucks in the parade, boots in hand, to collect donations for the Candlelighters Childhood Cancer Support Group.
“We’re very excited this year to partner with them,” says firefighter Henry Giesbrecht, who has a personal connection to the group. “Unfortunately, we had to use them at one point with my son being diagnosed.”
Giesbrecht’s son was just six when he was diagnosed with leukemia. He’s now a healthy 16-year-old.
But while years have passed since the family went through their battle with cancer, Giesbrecht says they’ve never forgotten the kindness shown to them by Candlelighters’ volunteers.
“The level of support that they gave us, it was a no-brainer to support them now,” he says.
Candlelighters board chair Naomi Fehr says the funds raised this weekend will help them keep their annual family camp going.
“Donations like these are just such a huge boost to us,” she says. “We literally just had a meeting talking about cutting back, but for me it’s never about cutting back—it’s always about finding more sources of funding … we’re so appreciative of the support from our local area.”
The camp weekend—which this year takes place mid-September at Hecla Island—is all about having fun and building connections.
“We have people who are in treatment, people who have completed treatment. We also have bereaved families. It’s a mash of all sorts,” Fehr says. “It’s just a good time for the kids to connect outside of a hospital setting or outside of a clinic setting. They get to know each other, and lots of long-term bonds happen.”
Candlelighters also supports families dealing with a cancer diagnosis by providing parking passes for those with extended hospital stays, putting together care packages for newly diagnosed families, offering a food cart with drinks and snacks in the children’s cancer ward in Winnipeg as well as weekly meals for patents staying with their children as they receive treatment, overseeing a benevolent fund to help bereaved families, and providing gifts for childhood cancer survivors who graduate high school.
It’s all about supporting families, Fehr says, and “helping with the things that a lot of people maybe don’t thinking about, the necessities of life … we’re kind of behind the scenes and we do this stuff just to help them get through it.”
“We were floored,” Giesbrecht recalls of the first time his family connected with Candlelighters shortly after his son’s diagnosis. “She just called us, ‘Can we come bring you a package?’ And then what you find in there is this support package. It’s a great blessing. You realize you’re not alone and there’s more families that are going through this and people are thinking about you.”
The parade boot drive usually brings in several thousand dollars for charity each year, and Giesbrecht is optimistic it will do so again this weekend.
“Winkler is known for giving. Every single day, Winkler steps up, and it’s just unreal to see.”
Saturday’s parade starts at 10 a.m. at the corner of Pembina Ave. and 15th St. It travels east down Mountain Ave., north up Main Street, and then turns west on Roblin Ave. to end at Park St.
