Irish mothers’ lockdown project delivers toys to hundreds

Many children opening gifts across the country on Christmas morning will not know that Santa got help from a Facebook group based in Birr, Co Offaly called “Santa Claus Anonymous.”

The mysteriously titled group, and the two Irish mothers behind it, are quietly responsible for filling out the wish lists of hundreds of children across the country before Christmas Eve this year.

What started as a small “lockdown project” to anonymously deliver toys to local families struggling amid the pandemic has now placed gifts under the tree in homes from Kerry to Dublin to Donegal.

“We honestly thought when we went up the page that maybe two or three moms would contact us and we would work it out with each other … but in three days we had over 1,000 followers on Facebook.” Mary Beth O’Brien, one of the mothers behind the group, said.

“What started as buying a few toys for some families has completely escalated and there are more than 200 kids on the list right now.”

We were so upset thinking of all these kids without toys on Christmas Day

O’Brien said the project began when she and her friend, Marie Buckley, were making their monthly donation to a local charity, The Ken Smollen Food Appeal.

“He has more than 860 families on his list … He was just talking about all the kids who would not have toys this year, because he knows all these families and the bad positions they are in,” he said.

“My friend and I are mothers too … it bothered us so much to think of all these children without toys on Christmas Day, we thought we would do our thing with toys.”

After setting up the social media pages for the Santa Claus project, the mothers saw group members, offers of help and donations pour in quickly.

“There were so many people asking us for help and I think the hardest part of it all was hearing their stories and the situations that most people find themselves in right now,” said Ms. O’Brien.

“In a way it opened our eyes to what was going on, such a difficult year for some people with Covid. Some people’s Covid payments stopped for some reason, or a lot of people said ‘last year it was me who donated to different charities and now I’m the one looking for a charity’, it was very sad. “

Several small businesses offered their locations as donation drop-off points, allowing mothers to collect piles of new toys from around the country.

“We get so many donations … someone would contact us and say, ‘what will I get?’ who would love it [blank present]”Ms. O’Brien said.

“So we were sorting the children with what they wanted, but we also gave each child something extra: each household received a jigsaw and a Lego and arts and crafts, along with the toys they asked for.”

Labeling, packaging, and posting large numbers of donations quickly became a full-time job, involving both a warehouse and a mini truck loaned to the project by Ms. O’Brien’s father.

“I would drop my son off at 9:30 to go to school and go straight to the warehouse where everything is, but he could be there until 7:30 at night,” he said.

Grateful moms

The project kept Ms O’Brien busy as her 12-year-old business, the Diva Beauty Salon in Birr, remained closed due to coronavirus restrictions.

“If I was working there was no way I could do it because I was doing it on my own during the week because Marie lives in Cork… she was still working but she would come over on weekends to give me a hand,” he said.

“It just took over my life completely, which I’m not complaining about,” O’Brien said. “It was a very rewarding thing to do … We had so many grateful moms crying on the phone just to say thank you.”

Completing a family’s Christmas wish list included a cart, high chair, toys, and a Tesco store. Another family contacted the project in the hope that their five-year-old son could get his own bed for Christmas.

The mother sent us a video … of the boy hugging the bed

After Ms. O’Brien went to a local business in Birr to try to purchase a bed at cost, the business owner donated one to the family for free and delivered it with a mattress.

“The mother sent us a video later, after they got the bed, of the little boy hugging the bed,” Ms O’Brien said.

“We ended up buying food, clothes and shoes, you know, a children’s bed, I didn’t expect it to increase that way. But hearing the positions that some families were in, it’s really horrible and I’ll be thinking about all of them on Christmas Day … I hope we made a difference for many families.

“We are thinking about how we can do it next year without having to take care of everything ourselves, because it is impossible to do it when you are also working … hopefully a lot more people will be in better positions next year as well. “