WESTLOCK - After cancelling the annual Nelly’s Night fundraiser, the Soul Sisters Memorial Foundation decided to replace it with a virtual entertainment night held Sept. 26.
“Our intent was just to connect with our supporters and people in general and give them a bit of entertainment on a Saturday night,” said charity president Christine Vachon.
The event turned into a Facebook live session to the tune of a familiar voice, longtime host Danny Hooper, and 16 other previous guest speakers and entertainers who recorded videos for the night.
“Everybody said kudos to us, that is was fun to watch. I mean, it’s weird because I like being in that room full of people, feeling that energy and giving hugs and stuff so that part was a little odd. But you do what you gotta do and you hope the next event we do can maybe be more back to normal,” said Vachon.
The video is still available to watch, pinned at the top of the Sisters’ Facebook page and racked up over 4,000 views.
“We’re trying to pivot and do what we can and think outside the box. I was laughing yesterday because I thought sometimes those plans work out better than you expected, you have to throw caution to the wind,” said Vachon.
“We’re trying to keep up with the time and do what we can. Of course, there’s a lot of people struggling due to isolation and there may be financial difficulties and that type of thing. We’re always keeping our eyes and our ears open trying to touch on those subjects.
Although they didn’t focus so much on the donation side of a typical Nelly’s Night, there was still interest from the public.
“People are asking if they can still donate, because we really didn’t have anything tied into fundraising per se, it was more of a night of entertainment and looking back. So that’s nice that people are still thinking of that in these trying times.”
Hooper donated a dinner for six and Renegade Station, last year’s entertainment, donated a house concert. Vachon is trying to work out the best way to auction them off.
“And we told people they can donate to the Robb Nash Project if they chose to, because usually at our big fundraiser every year, that’s an option too,” she said.
Ultimately, “It was a good night, it was as good as can be expected,” said Vachon, but she did add that she’d rather clean up after a real in-person event.
“I’m hopeful we are (going to have Nelly’s Night in person in 2021). I’m hoping we can actually start Farmer’s Appreciation in January, so we’ll see what that looks like.”
