Charles City FFA hands out nearly 150 Christmas Eve dinners

By James Grob, jgrob@charlescitypress.com

The title character in the movie “Elf” said, “The best way to spread Christmas cheer is singing loud for all to hear.”

Charles City FFA members know that it’s a lot easier to sing and spread cheer if you have a tummy full of food.

The students spent the morning of Christmas Eve in the Youth Enrichment Center, preparing, packaging and handing out 146 holiday meals at the Floyd County Fairgrounds to anyone who needed or wanted them.

“It was really cool to see our FFA members come together on Christmas Eve,” said FFA member Lauren Connell, a 2019 Charles City High School graduate. “It was good to see different people using their talents, problem solving and getting ready to distribute the meal.”

The dinners consisted of smoked pork loins, potatoes, corn, rolls, and a dessert. The meat was provided by the Deb and Jeff Hansen Foundation, which also granted the students an additional $250 to help finance the side dishes.

The foundation, formed by the founders of Iowa Select Farms, supports programs and projects that provide food to struggling Iowa families and children, shows gratitude to members of the Armed Forces and strengthens efforts to find a cure for childhood cancers while improving the quality of life for impacted families, according to the group’s website.

Connell said the FFA also received financial contributions from local individuals throughout the morning.

“It was so good to have people just offer some money to help out,” she said.

People drove through to pick up their meals, some vehicles getting just one dinner and others as many as eight dinners. The meals were handed out in the morning, so most of the students who prepared and distributed them were able to spend the afternoon and evening with their families on Christmas Eve.

At 11 a.m., however, the students realized that there were still several dinners that hadn’t been picked up.

“Some people forgot, some people weren’t able to get their cars started because of the cold, or had other transportation issues and weren’t able to get out there to pick it up in the morning,” Connell said.

So the students started calling people. They hadn’t initially intended to offer a delivery service, but Connell and others — including FFA advisors Jim Lundberg and Bret Spurgin — personally delivered meals to the homes of people who couldn’t get there to pick them up.

“To see the people’s faces when we knocked on their doors and gave them their meals — everyone was very grateful,” Connell said. “It was a good way to start off the two days of Christmas.”