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Sadie and the Batman bear (8 photos)

A local charity group set up a free-store 'giveaway' at the Great Northern Retirement Home on Thursday

Eighty-something Sadie Lamothe is going to give her Batman teddy bear to her first-born great grandchild, she hopes.

Lamothe got the bear for free at a 'giveaway' event held at her retirement home.

Local charity-group, Sault Ste. Marie Helping Hands, gave out clothes and other items at the Great Northern Retirement Home on Thursday. 

The group is non-profit, volunteer run, and was started in April 2014 by Wendy Gutcher, who continues to run it out of her home.

Gutcher said she’s built up a reputation around town. Sault Ste. Marie Helping Hands volunteers collect clothes and other items and Gutcher stores them at her home while a team of volunteers helps wash, fold, store, and hand out the items to those in need.

20170727-Helping Hands-JK-11Sault Ste. Marie Helping Hands founder Wendy Gutcher in her 'office' which is full of donated items. These items are used at community 'giveaway' events like the type held at the Great Northern Retirement Home on Thursday. Jeff Klassen/SooToday

The volunteer team runs thrift-store-like ‘giveaways’ where anyone attending can take what they want at no cost.

They've held these giveaways at places like the Sault Community Career Center, Crawford Avenue Hub, Pine Hill Church, and most recently, on Thursday at the Great Northern Retirement Home.

From noon until 4 p.m., the second-floor kitchen and lounge areas of the retirement home were converted to a take-what-you-want closet, and residents picked through bins, tables, and racks of clothes and other items.

Lamothe, who has been at the retirement home for about a year, was so happy to have found a teddy bear wearing a Batman hoodie.

The retired Sunshine Travel Club guide, who still has a Scottish accent even though she came to Canada as a teen, said her granddaughter was recently married.

Lamothe hopes her granddaughter will be busy adding another generation to the family and she wants to have a nice fuzzy friend ready just in case.

“This will be for whatever comes along,” said Lamothe, holding the bear.


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Jeff Klassen

About the Author: Jeff Klassen

Jeff Klassen is a SooToday staff reporter who is always looking for an interesting story
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