Incoming mail for the homeless

Incoming mail for the homeless.

My mail box has been jammed packed with incoming mail for the homeless, literally, every day this week. The lovely staff at my local Canada Post outlet have taken to kindly stashing the letters and packages of letters behind their counter.

For those of you who might be new here, I’m talking about a project called makeitmerry, that is all about sending Christmas cards to the homeless.

Message that move the heart

As I and others read through the incoming mail for the homeless, the messages move our hearts. From the young and the older, people write notes of hope, inspiration and share their own stories. Some of the cards coming in this year are in other languages; Spanish and French. I absolutely love this idea and I think it is the beginning of something new for makeitmerry.  I am hoping we can find recipients that will especially appreciate a Christmas card in their own language.

There are drawings, homemade snowflakes inserted inside cards, some transit tickets and many Tim Horton gift cards.  People are so generous and moved to help the homeless it makes my heart smile.

Only Santa gets more mail

We had our first delivery of 600 cards last week to Feed The Hungry. It was on a bitterly cold evening when I joined the volunteers providing a hot meal to the homeless. I had the honor of handing out your cards.

I met a gentleman named Robert. Instead of keeping his Christmas card he wanted to me to mail it to his brother in Ontario. He shared that he hadn’t seen or talked to his brother in years and just wanted his brother to know that he was ok and was thinking of him at Christmas. Robert remembered the address and I put a stamp on it and mailed it away.

Stories like this confirm that sending a Christmas card to someone who is homeless has the power to move hearts in ways we can’t even fathom. I’m so grateful to be a small part of it.

We have two more deliveries this week; 425 cards on Monday and 1400 cards on December 23rd.  Stay tuned for more updates or visit makeitmerry’s instagram page.

P.S. Did anyone notice the typewritten address on those envelopes? A person after my own heart.