Beautifully made clay bowls, filled with delectable soup. A simple fundraising idea that works.
The Harvest Bowl fundraiser for the hungry doesn’t happen until the fall. But organizational work and community rallying has already begun.
Each year, the event fills locally made clay bowls with hearty soups, raising over $10,000 annually for Chalmers Community Service Centre. The soup warms a tummy, and the bowls find a home.
On Sunday, the Creative Cafe event at Silence in the downtown, hosted by the Rickson Ridge Neighbourhood Association, acted as a kind of kick-starter for Harvest Bowls. A number of performers, and a full house of audience members, helped raise money for the charitable effort. A number of clay bowls were made at the event, and potter Chris Hierlihy has agreed to fire them in his kiln.
Rhondda Lymburner organizes Harvest Bowl, a fundraiser started by Three Willows United Church to support Chalmers. Local potters donate bowls and restaurant owners donate soup. Supper guests buy a $35 ticket to enjoy as many of the soups as they like, and they keep the bowl. It happens on the last Wednesday of October in the Three Willows sanctuary.
“We raise about $12,000 for the purchase of food for Chalmers Community Service Centre,” said Lymburner in an interview on Monday. “We’ve had a number of potters that donate pottery bowls to us over the years. We collect as many bowls as we can, and then we contact various restaurants for soup.”
About eight restaurants have supported Harvest Bowl with soup donations, and many potters, including those from the newly formed Guelph Potters Guild, have been very supportive, she said.
Kim Davids Mandar, neighbourhood support worker for Rickson Ridge Neighbourhood Association, contacted Lymburner to see how the association could help Harvest Bowl.
“Kim has been at the Harvest Bowl and she was really inspired by the event,” Lymburner said. “It has a very warm, welcoming feeling.”
Davids Mandar had the idea that Rickson Ridge people could make some pottery and donate it to Harvest Bowls. That’s what was happening on Sunday afternoon at Silence.
Lymburner was very excited by the idea of a community organization helping in that way.
Harvest Bowl has a sponsorship with the Bank of Nova Scotia. When five people from the bank agree to volunteer at the event, the bank contributes up to $5,000 in matching funds.
