Volunteers at Blue Square in Logan prepare Thanksgiving dinners for some 1,000 people in Cache Valley for a free meal delivered to their home.
LOGAN – The United Hearts to Home – a grassroots group of businesses, service groups and volunteers – completed their first Thanksgiving Day meal delivery to nearly 1,000 homebound families and individuals across the valley.
Jimmy Birman, executive director of United Way of Cache Valley, and Liz Butcher of Butchers Bunches and Utah Artisan Mercantile organized, cooked and delivered Thanksgiving meals to families and individuals who couldn’t make it to a traditional meal.
Butcher said Utah State University catering brought over 32 cooked turkeys and several trays of stuffing.
“We had several people and businesses come in and donate money when they came in and saw what we were doing,” she said. “It’s been amazing to see what the community has done to help.”
“We had over 325 volunteers show from the beginning to the end. Some came Thursday after we were done just to help clean up,” he said. “We had 22 volunteers show up on Monday, 33 on Tuesday and 96 on Wednesday and two help deliver the meals on Thursday. We had over 150 volunteers.”
The effort took a month of planning by the board of directors. The number of volunteers who showed up made every day go smoother and faster than they anticipated
“This is the start of something bigger,” Birman said. “The response from the community and businesses was incredible.”
The volunteers came from as far away as Salt Lake City and Ogden to help.
“I had a lady drive up from Salt Lake on Thursday morning to help,” he said. “She told me she came to Logan because she couldn’t find anything like this in Salt Lake.”
Nadine Schoonmaker said her husband was on hospice so they weren’t able to go out or have many people into their home. They expressed appreciation for the meal delivery.
“We had a lovely meal,” she said. “Please thank all the workers for us. It was thoughtful and generous. It was good to know that those who couldn’t be with family still had a lovely meal. I’m sure this took days to prepare and for the one day delivery. Bless you all.”
Over 135 people gave up their own Thanksgiving to deliver meals to people across the valley.
“This is why Cache Valley is so special,” he said. “Everyone cares about each other.”