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Sweet! Port Coquitlam seniors' home gets special delivery of Girl Guide cookies

Residents of Astoria Retirement Residence in Port Coquitlam plan to give some boxes to staff to say thanks for their hard work and sell the rest at their little store
Astoria retirement residence
Seniors living at the Astoria Retirement Residence in Port Coquitlam are excited to receive eight cases of Girl Guide cookies to gift to staff at the facility as well as to sell through its small general store.

Seniors at the Astoria Retirement Residence in Port Coquitlam are not letting the COVID-19 pandemic sour their appetite for sweet cookies.

Monday, members of the 1st Hyde Creek Brownies delivered eight cases of Girl Guide cookies to the facility on Kelly Avenue that is home to 150 people.

Jim Peacock, an Astoria resident who helped organize the effort, said the cookies will be a welcome taste of normalcy amidst the anxiety of being isolated from loved ones, practising physical distancing and keeping close to home to ensure everyone stays healthy.

“It’s given us an added piece of interest and something to do,” Peacock told The Tri-City News, adding several of the residents have had daughters and granddaughters involved in Guiding over the years and their cookie sales are always highly anticipated.

Peacock, a former longtime Port Moody resident, said it’s also a way for residents to express their gratitude to Astoria’s staff, who’ve been working hard to keep them safe, well-fed and entertained under trying circumstances. Each is being gifted a box of the cookies, with the rest offered for sale through the home’s small general store.

Sue Bolton, a recreation manager at Astoria, said while morale at the home remains upbeat, group activities have been curtailed, social interaction has become more difficult and strolls outside the front doors have been restricted to just the immediate neighbourhood, with no stops for coffee or knickknacks in nearby downtown Port Coquitlam.

“This will be a bright spark for them,” she said of the cookies’ arrival.

The idea of connecting the Girl Guide cookies with the residents came from news reports that the organization was trying to figure how to operate its semiannual fundraiser when the girls can’t get out to actually sell the cookies.

A number of retailers have bought cases for resale.

Then, Peacock put the idea of getting a bulk order for the residence to the council of residents that organizes various events and it was Bolton who put the wheels in motion to make it happen by reaching out to the 1st Hyde Creek group, which had visited last January to read to Astoria residents.

“The idea was we’d help the Girls Guides get started,” Peacock said, adding events like a raffle were organized to collect the funds needed for the boxes that will be going to staff.

“They just embrace everything,” Bolton said of the residents’ cookie initiative. “They want so much to be involved and they don’t want to shut their lives away.”

To ensure everyone’s safety, Bolton added each box of chocolate and vanilla biscuits will be wiped down with a disinfectant before it’s passed out or put up for sale.

“We’re pretty strict on that.”