Large donation looming for SVP thanks to Caoimhe

THERE was a large monetary donation looming for Saint Vincent De Paul thanks to the effort’s of Newry girl Caoimhe McLernon.

 Young Miss McLernon, who is a proud pupil of Saint Patrick’s Primary School the Meadow, has handed over a bountiful donation of over £100.00 to the much beloved charity after selling a variety of different accessories crafted from loom bands. 

 Made from rubber and plastic loom bands are a bright   coloured material   perfect for crafting bracelets, charms, and  neclaces for both decoration as well as sharing with your friends.

 Whilst it would not be unexpected that a girl of Caoimhe’s age would be imbued with a considerable degree of talent when it comes to crafting these materials into adorable trinkets for her friends and family to enjoy, were young Miss McLurnen decided to take things  a step further was in her  mass production of these accessories which she opted to sell on with all funds raised going directly to Saint Vincent De Paul.    

Caoimhe’s motivation in doing this was as  she  explained her awareness  of those who are less fortunate in the community during the festive period.

Helping the less fortunate

“I always wanted to give to Saint Vincent De Paul.” said Caoimhe. I am a very lucky person to get a lot of stuff at Christmas and I wanted other children to be lucky and feel happy at Christmas as well.

“The bracelets were called loom bands and I used my fingers to make them. There were fish tail, normal, thick and really thick. You could get bracelets, hair baubles, ankle brackets or necklaces. I sold them to all my family and friends along with my mum and aunties work colleagues.”

Although the crafting of keepsakes through the use of loom bands can be a time consuming and painstaking procedure, this did not deter young Caoimhe from creating as many accessories as possible, with her efforts being thoroughly appreciated by SVP representative Ethne Keenan.

Time well spent

“An original bracelet could take 5 minutes, the fishtail bracelet 10 minutes, the thick fish tail 20 minutes and then the necklace could take 30 minutes.

“I still have a wee box of examples to show to people what the different types of bands are and what way it turns out.

“I phoned Ethne. She was delighted and she said thank you so much this is going to buy lot of Christmas Dinners. She was really appreciative of it. The money is going towards Christmas dinners and presents for all the people who may not get presents on Christmas Day.”

Expressing her sincerest hopes that the entrepreneurial and altruistic endeavours engaged in by her beloved daughter  may long continue was Caoimhe’ s mother Aoibheann who shared in the fact that whilst in the process of her daughters crafting of the loom bands she ran low on the colours red and black for one very specific reason.  

Down right success

 ”Caoimhe enjoys making loom bands. They are wee plastic things that you shape into different colours. People were putting in requests for different colours for things such as their football club. This was the market for them. Loom bands are little plastic circles that you shape together using your two fingers. You double tag, them and twist them to make the different sizes and then as Caoimhe says there is fishtails which is a different technique. Caoimhe made them all. She did up a little sheet of paper with all the types and the costs, some were 20p, some were 10p, 40p and 75p. She made a lot of bracelets

“It went on for a number of weeks and then she wanted to close up the orders for Christmas to get the money to Ethne. We appreciate all that we have and know that we are blessed and can afford things but not everyone can get what we get. We are lucky like this. Caoimhe said she would do this and I was ordering all the different colours. Red was the colour she ran out of because we are Down fans so she was making red and black ones by the bucketful. We also had to order in some more orange as well.

“When she made the call to Ethne to explain what she was doing she got of the phone and she was very happy because she said Ethne got emotional on the phone. Caoimhe could see the difference she was making by the phone call to Ethne. She won't know who she is helping but she is doing a good thing. She is only 10 years of age so long may this continue.”