SPARCC hosts socially distanced Cookies, Cakes and Carolers event

The organization normally hosts a lunch with the same name.

By Nat Kaemmerer
| 7:16 p.m. December 7, 2020

Sarasota
Neighbors

Winter wonderlands may look a little different in 2020. For SPARCC, their parking lot became a source of Christmas cheer for the evening on Dec. 5 as they hosted their annual Cookies, Cakes and Carolers event.

Though it has the same name as the organization's annual holiday luncheon, this year it was a pandemic-friendly drop-off toy drive-through. Volunteers decorated the parking lot with lights and every time a car drove up, a gaggle of cheerful SPARCC elves greeted the donor with bells, cheers and a send-off of cookies and candy canes.

"What's been interesting was we had to find a big workaround," co-chair Maggie Shaw said. "To go from a sit-down lunch with 140 people to this was a leap."

"We call it a transitional event," co-chair Andrea Andrus added

More than 20 cars had come through by half an hour into the event, a happy turnout, CEO and President Jessica Hays said. The toys came unwrapped and will be set up at SPARCC for a shopping day for those served by the organization. Clients will come in and shop for Christmas toys for their children at no cost to them.