Giving a little holiday joy to people in Lake County and beyond who are hospitalized or in assisted living facilities for Christmas is a collaborative effort of a local not-for-profit corporation making ornaments and another charitable organization that distributes them.
Participants in the Art Impact Project created the ornaments at locations in Waukegan, Mundelein and Highland Park recently for distribution by HOPE Ornaments to hospitals and assisted living facilities in Lake County and elsewhere before Christmas.
Each year around the holiday season, Vickie Marasco, who started the Art Impact Project in 2014, guides people through making Christmas ornaments as part of the ongoing mission of the organization. She helps people through other types of art projects the rest of the year.
“We enhance emotional wellness through creative expression,” Marasco said. “We meld interest and creative expression to help people struggling with mental and emotional health concerns. We give them the opportunity to express themselves and talk to other people.”
– Original Credit: News-Sun
Elizabeth Elliott, the founder of HOPE Ornaments and a Grayslake resident, spends most of the year collecting ornaments and raising money to buy them. Come Christmastime, she delivers them to hospitals and assisted living facilities for people who will not be home for the holidays.
“I was (once) thinking, I hope I’ll be home for Christmas next year and it just clicked,” Elliott said about the time 15 years ago when she got the idea to start HOPE Ornaments.
Marasco, a Lake Forest resident, said she and Elliott did not know each other until they met at the election night party for Illinois Supreme Court Justice Elizabeth Rochford Oct. 8. They met knowing nothing about each other.
As Elliott and Marasco started talking they realized they could collaborate to help Christmas be a little less lonely for people who are hospitalized or staying in assisted living centers. Rochford said she was happy about the role she played.
“I have long been an admirer and supporter of both people who run those respective programs,” Rochford said. “It’s a natural they would work together. To be a conduit for these fabulous, committed, generous people fills my heart with pure joy.”
While Elliott said she hopes to distribute approximately 8,000 ornaments in Lake County, Chicago, suburban Cook and DuPage counties by Christmas, she is very appreciative of the handmade ones coming from the Art Impact Project.
“It’s huge,” Elliott said. “They’re making all their ornaments this year just for me.”
– Original Credit: News-Sun
Marasco said she worked with residents at Bridge House halfway house in Waukegan, students at Mundelein High School and the staff at Curt’s Café, guiding them through ornament making.
While working with people at places like Bridge House — the residents are coming out of substance abuse programs or incarceration — Marasco said the participants’ task is to make at least two. She estimates between 75 and 100 will be made overall.
“They make one to keep, and one to give back,” Marasco said. “They usually donate them all. It’s a blessing for them because they are doing something for somebody else. They are doing something that will be joyous for everybody.”
Each of the people Marasco is guiding through ornament making during the holiday season is on a personal journey using art to express themselves, while at the same time providing a holiday gift for someone else.
“Art of any type is a most powerful form of expression,” Marasco said. “They are bringing a sense of joy to someone in need.”
Though she does not plan to start the ornament delivery until Dec. 22, Elliott said she spends the rest of the year starting after Christmas getting ornament donations or raising money to purchase them. Some of her donors take advantage of post-Christmas sales.
“One donor goes to the store the day after Christmas and buys everything on the clearance table for us,” Elliott said
Among the places Elliott said she will be delivering ornaments in Lake County are Vista Medical Center East in Waukegan, the Lake County Children’s Advocacy Center in Gurnee, Advocate Condell Medical Center in Libertyville and Advocate Good Shepherd Hospital in Barrington.
