Shelburne- The Shelburne County Pet Valu Peewee A Flames have taken up the Chevrolet Good Deeds Cup challenge and with their entry now submitted they are waiting to hear if they will be among the top 10 finalists for the $100,000 grand prize.
But for the lives they touched with their good deeds, they are already winners.
The team decided to take up the challenge last fall after hearing about the Good Deeds Cup from their coach Trevor Spencer and his team assistant/wife Jennifer. The first good deed was a visit to seniors living at the long-term care facility, Bayside Home, delivering Christmas cards and cookies to all the residents.
Good deeds two and three were done together, with the players packaging groceries to collect donations for the two food banks in Shelburne County on Dec. 30 at No Frills in Barrington, raising more than $550 in under three hours.
“People were insanely generous,” said Jennifer Spencer. “When people heard what the kids were doing and were going to actually going to do the shopping themselves, people were all over it,” she said, adding the more donations the players received “the more pumped and excited they got.”
The players did their homework before hitting the grocery isles with their shopping carts, getting guidance on what to purchase from Feed Nova Scotia online lists, and input from the Kings Kitchen Food Bank in Woods Harbour and the Loyalist Food Bank in Shelburne.
“The kids went with it. They did it themselves,” said Spencer, from making the signs to promote the fundraising event and creating a budget for the shopping expedition, to editing the video for submission. “It was a good life lesson for them.”
When packing groceries, the players also handed out flyers to families with a list of 100 good deeds that kids can do to help their communities and the people in them as their third good deed.
The good deeds done by the Flames were “different experiences that teaches good lessons for the team,” said player Ollie Tipton, who said he and his teammates had fun. “The most fun was packing groceries and shopping,” he said.
The top 10 finalists’ videos will be posted online on Jan. 26. Public voting will determine the top three finalists. The winner will be selected by a panel from Hockey Canada and Chevrolet.
