By PAMELA ROBINSON, Register Staff Writer
Gainesville Daily Register
Gainesville —
The 11th annual Stanford House Donation Drive continues this Saturday with the garage sale which starts at 8 a.m. and goes until 4 p.m. The drawing for the 2010 Chevrolet Silverado Truck will take place at 3:30 p.m. at the Stanford House.
Lunch and entertainment will also be part of the day and prize drawings will include a $500 Wal-Mart gift card, a $250 Wal-Mart gift card and a $100 Wal-Mart gift card.
Carolyn Castleberry, Stanford House Executive Director said the Donation Drive for this year has already been very successful.
“Tickets for the truck raffle have been sold out,” Castleberry noted.
“Let me tell you something that’s very amazing. I keep a chart of our ticket sales and I kind of post it out in the lobby,” Castleberry said showing this year’s chart. “Do you know with the economy the way it is, we are running over two weeks ahead on our sales all the time?”
This Saturday will be a very busy day at the Stanford House.
“They’ll be at the door when we open,” said Stanford House Advisory Board Member James Hackler of the 8 a.m. opening. “It’s going to be a madhouse.”
“They’ll be grabbing and boxing up and they’ll be lined up at the cash register,” Castleberry said. “They’ll be carrying it out by the boxes.”
Saturday will also include lunch provided by Integra Care.
“We ask for a donation,” Castleberry said of the lunch. “We also do have entertainment. Singers of all ages will be performing.”
The event includes a silent auction as well.
“We have some silent auction items, that we have up for people to bid on through the day,” Castleberry noted. “The items will be on display and then the winners will be determined in the afternoon so people can pick up the items.”
Last year the Saturday cakewalk with over 40 cakes raised about $600 for the Stanford House.
“We will have at least that many cakes this year as well,” Castleberry noted.
The tickets for the truck drawing sold out early this year.
“We’re already sold out this year and we appreciate everybody participating,” Castleberry said. “We will never print more than 1,000 tickets. That’s what it will be from now on. We could sell more. I bet we could have sold 100 more already. We could probably, by the time the drawing takes place, sell up to 200 more of the tickets but, we just have a limit.”
Castleberry said she is pleased that more people are learning about Stanford House and what they do for the community.
“We have workshops and we also provide socializing,” she noted. “We do traveling. We provide exercising. We have an indoor walking area that maybe a lot of people in the community are not aware of.”
The Time-Out support group for caregivers is also an important part of the Stanford House.
There are so many activities that go on here, she continued.
“We do quilting for the public and all the proceeds that they receive from quilting go to the Stanford House for operations,” she said. “People bring in their own quilt tops and our ladies hand quilt them and the money they charge they give to the Stanford House. Their work is very comparable to some of the Amish quilts that we see.”
The Stanford House is open to all members of the community ages 55 and over.
“We want people to know they can come on down and have a good time,” Castleberry said. “You can walk in here whether the weather’s bad outside and it’s warm. If it’s hot outside, it’s cool in here. It’s also a very safe environment.”
Last year the Donation Drive raised more than $36,000 for the Stanford House.
The Stanford House is located at 401 W. Garnett St. in Gainesville.
For more information call the Stanford House at (940) 668-1452.
