Twelve days of holiday cheer

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 13/12/2017 (3144 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

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I have never had to sing for my supper, but I am thrilled to announce that earlier this week I volunteered to sing for someone else’s supper.

This came about Tuesday morning when Winnipeg Harvest invited me and a couple of buddies to visit their warehouse at 1085 Winnipeg Ave., and put our vocal cords on the line for their 12 Days of Giving social media fundraiser.

The way it works is, each and every day from Dec. 12-24, the food bank will post heart-tugging videos on its Facebook page (facebook.com/wpgharvest) wherein local personalities will sing about a specific item Harvest needs to make the holidays brighter for families in need. It’s all set to the tune of the beloved carol, The Twelve Days of Christmas.

Instead of enumerating partridges in pear trees and turtle doves and maids-a-milking, however, we local personalities will festively sing about the desperate need to donate items, including turkeys, canned food and baby formula.

“It’s kind of like a reverse Advent calendar,” is how Sarah Henry, the food bank’s development associate for signature events, explained it to me on Tuesday. “Instead of getting something each day, we’re revealing a new way for people to give each day.

“It’s not all food. We cover all three of the ways people can give to Harvest — food, time (as in volunteering) and money. There are a lot of different charities out there doing a Christmas push and this is Harvest’s way of standing out.”

The general idea is that Harvest will post a new video each of the 12 days and, after you hear some local celebrity — including famed singer-songwriter Sierra Noble on Day 9 — the videos will go viral, encouraging people to dig deep in their pockets and pantries to donate the items featured in the videos.

The first video was posted Tuesday and featured Harvest’s executive director, Kate Brenner, crooning about “A turkey for the Christmas feast.” In today’s Day 2 video, Peak of the Market CEO Larry McIntosh and his wife, Shelley, belt out the need for “two pounds of food.”

Which brings us to Day 3, which will be posted on Thursday (although you can watch it right now on our website, winnipegfreepress.com) and features the golden-throated warbling of myself and my dear buddies Jordan Van Sewell, the acclaimed Winnipeg sculptor, and Big Daddy Tazz, the red-hot comedian with the huge heart.

For the record, the three of us are not blessed with pleasing voices, but we threw ourselves into the Harvest video because it’s Christmas and we knew, deep in our hearts, we would go out for breakfast after filming the video.

When Tazz slipped off his overcoat, he was sporting an electric green Christmas sweater — “I’M WEARING MY ELF SWEATER!” he shrieked — topped with a stylish elf-style tuque. For his part, Jordan was decked out in a wool suit (jackets and pants) made entirely from red and black lumberjack-pattern material.

“It’s a Kenora tuxedo,” our sculptor buddy boasted. “This is one of my Christmas outfits. It’s kind of festive. When Kenora secedes from Ontario and joins Manitoba, everybody will be wearing one.”

My outfit was somewhat more subdued — your basic Santa hat and a bright red nose made out of foam rubber. Tazz eyeballed my bright red beak and snorted: “You look like Rudolph’s drunken brother. Your nose is a perfect target for punching.”

Then it was time to film our part of the 12 Days of Giving, wherein we all sang in unison: “On the Third Day of Giving, we give families in need…”

Which is when Jordan sings: “Three canned fruits.”

And I chime in: “Two pounds of food.”

And Tazz belts out: “And a turkey for the Christmas feast!’

It’s supposed to end there, but Tazz, seized by the Christmas spirit, began walking toward the camera and spouting something that I didn’t have time to write down but went a little like this: “Here’s what you’re gonna do — you’re gonna donate food or we’re coming to your house… the elf’s coming to take the food from your place, because some people don’t have stuff on their plate. You throw away a lot of food, anyway, so put the stuff you haven’t cooked yet — not the turkey, because you can’t put a turkey in a bag, but good stuff like macaroni and canned goods — and bring it to Winnipeg Harvest.”

Despite not being totally in tune, the early reviews were positive.

“You guys were good,” Harvest’s Sarah Henry chirped. “No, really. You were really loud, big voices. You disturbed the whole office, but in a good way.”

Chimed in my bearded buddy Jordan: “It was gold! It’s a good thing we were working on behalf of making the world a better place. If we did what we just did for evil, the world wouldn’t have a chance.”

Harvest is hoping this year’s seasonal song videos will bring in even more donations than last year, when the agency raised more than $27,000 and collected 11,000 pounds of food over the 12 days.

“For us, the donations we get at this time of year help us get through the first few months of winter,” Sarah explained. “Christmas really helps us get set up for the spring. (At Christmas) Families have the extra burden of gifts and big dinners. Money is tighter for everyone, especially families on low incomes.”

So, please, Winnipeg, watch all 12 Facebook videos, share them, then donate whatever you can… because no one should have to sing for their supper.

doug.speirs@freepress.mb.ca