Some of the women on the island work together to create a prize for the annual raffle draw. The prize is awarded at the AGM in August and is our main community fundraising effort to support the volunteer fire department. The prize alternates from a knitted afghan one year to a quilt the next. Anyone who wants to help is invited to join in on the project. All efforts are appreciated. Some of us had never quilted or knit before we moved here. The more skilled are happy to teach those of us who know nothing and, as the years progress, the skill sets improve.

The projects are fun and a great way to contribute to the community. With a somewhat limited opportunity to sell tickets on a small island, they are usually sold from the May long weekend pancake breakfast until the last moments before the start of the August AGM. We normally sell about 750 tickets at $2.00 each. It is common that it is the quilters/knitters ourselves who buy most of the tickets. Less expenses, we usually raise about $1000.00.

It could be the fact that the real estate market went crazy this year and every single property which was for sale, sold, resulting in the substantial increase of the population. Or it could be the ease of on-line ticket sales. I like to think it is the quilt itself which drew the demand because we sold out of tickets in May after ten days. Our application with BC Lotteries only requested 1000 tickets but we could have asked to sell more. In ten years we have never sold that many, so who knew? It’s kind of wacky but as my sister in law said, trees, what’s not to like?

I thought you might be interested in an update on the bear at the salmon net site. It seems the community at the remote lake have a project of their own.

Our son sent us the latest pictures from the trail cam at the rope holding the nets in place. Apparently it isn’t just the bear who thinks the salmon should be released. In the same place, the recent pictures are of a deer and a coyote chewing the same rope. This deer risks his life and limb, in an area which must obviously smell like coyote and bear, to chew on a rope holding salmon in a net. It seems the release of the salmon has become an

unlikely communal effort

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