Christmas Hope Campaign helped with LSCO’s exposure

By Lethbridge Herald on January 8, 2026.

Alejandra Pulido-Guzman

LETHBRIDGE HERALD

Senior residents were able to have a Merry Christmas thanks to the Golden Giving Tree program offered by the Lethbridge Senior Citizens Organization and the helping hand of the Christmas Hope Campaign. 

Executive director Kaitlynn Weaver said being part of the Christmas Hope Campaign for the first time was not only a huge success, but also a great collaboration that brought mutual benefits for those involved. 

“Being part of the Christmas Hope Campaign was so important. Not only for seniors with gift giving and nominations of those who are financially struggling or socially isolated, but also for the organization as well,” said Weaver. 

She explained that they had multiple people who learned about what the LSCO does for seniors in the community thanks to the Christmas Hope Campaign.  

“Being able to partner with the other agencies and have conversations, they were then able to connect their clients with us if it made sense for a referral. A really great way for people to get to know the LSCO,” said Weaver. 

She said they had 207 seniors who were gifted different things, thanks to donations coming from the Christmas Hope Campaign and the Golden Giving Tree locations, which made it convenient for members of the community to grab a tag a drop off a gift. 

“We had our trees up at London Drugs, Nord-Bridge Senior Centre and here at LSCO. It was great because people had a couple options to pick up tags and drop off gifts,” said Weaver. 

She said this was all possible thanks to the organizing group and the volunteers that helped them, with some of them being referred to them by Volunteer Lethbridge, which is also a partner in the Christmas Hope Campaign. 

“We had 22 volunteers between gift wrappers and delivery drivers, and they put in about 82 hours, which was far more than the year before when we had five to eight volunteers,” said Weaver. “The LSCO support services team managed by Amy Cook were so impressive with the logistics of finding and booking volunteers from volunteer Lethbridge, and to give them enough things to do.”  

She said that thanks to the success the Golden Giving Tree had this year by being part of the Christmas Hope Campaign, they will continue to be part of it for years to come. 

“We were a little bit concerned about how marketed the Christmas Hope Campaign is, and we worried that we wouldn’t have enough funds or gifts to support the number of seniors nominated, but that was not at all the case. The community really stepped up to support seniors, which we were really grateful for,” said Weaver. 

She added this meant a lot those who received gifts during the Christmas holidays, and they made sure to let her know about it. 

“I had a bunch of voicemails and emails from people who were so grateful that they received a gift. I had one from somebody who actually started to cry. He was so grateful. He’s homebound, has very few family members in the area, as well as a disability that makes it hard for him to get out of bed in the morning. So, he was really grateful,” said Weaver.