Wega-Fremont girls share holiday spirit

By Angie Landsverk

The Weyauwega-Fremont High School girl’s basketball team brought the spirit of the season to residents of a local nursing home this December.

On Dec. 21, the team and its two coaches delivered Christmas cookies to Crossroads Care Center, in Weyauwega.

“This was the idea of a couple parents. They were thinking of team building activities,” said Todd Breuer, who is the team’s head coach.

On Dec. 20, the team practiced until 5 p.m. and then headed to Breuer’s science classroom in the middle school to decorate cookies.

Nancy Bleck, the mother of one of the girls on the team, baked the approximately 240 cookies ahead of time.

The girls then added frosting and sprinkles to all of them, as holiday music played in the background.

As they chatted and worked on decorating the cookies, high school social studies teacher Tom Chase stopped by the classroom and acknowledged their service project.

He told the girls they were doing a great thing and said no matter what happens on the basketball court, what they were doing was a “championship thing.”

Their cookie decorating party was followed by their own holiday party.

The next night, they delivered the cookies to Crossroads Care Center, where some nursing home residents joined them in the lobby area.

The cookies arrived just in time for the resident’s Christmas party, which took place on Dec. 22.

Tim Dietzen is the administrator of the nursing home, and he said numerous individuals and groups visit Crossroads Care Center during the holiday season.

School choirs and bands share songs with the residents, area Scouts spend time with the residents and this year, a Mary Kay consultant gave each resident a gift bag, he said.

“There’s lot of generous people in the community that show up and make people feel good,” Dietzen said.

Residents thanked the girls and their coaches for bringing cookies and thinking of them.

“We hope you like them,” Breuer said. “We’ll bring some cookies out next year again for you.”

He said the activity gave his team a change of pace and while also served as a way to build them as a team.

“We have great parental support. They always have great ideas for what we can do for the program,” he said.

Breuer also said the project spoke to the character of the girls.

“They’re a great group of kids,” he said. “They’re good kids outside of basketball, too and good members of the community.”