This Montreal mother brings the spirit of Santa Claus to thousands of kids, women in need
Have you ever wondered what Santa’s workshop looks like?
Carolyn Bouchard’s garage offers a clue.
And her living room. And sometimes even take a shower.
For the past 20 years, Bouchard has turned her Notre-Dame-de-Grâce home into a toy charity to collect Christmas gifts for thousands of underprivileged children, women and newcomers to the greater Montreal area.
“I remember at one point I literally hyperventilated because I didn’t have anything to put stuff on,” Bouchard said, laughing.
“I had [gifts for one] Shelter in the shower, the other shelters stacked in my hall closet…in the garage and all over the place up the stairs…and literally in our room around our bed.”
Carolyn’s Toy Drive – as the grassroots organization is known – began when Bouchard and her husband volunteered to collect and wrap gifts for a small list of children as part of an annual mini drive with family and friends.
When the rest of the gang got too busy to keep going, Bouchard took over the operation — and not half-heartedly.
“I like taking on challenges on a different level, and I didn’t have kids at the time so I was able to do that,” she said.
Two decades and three kids later, giving back is Bouchard’s full-time job. This year, their toy drive will deliver gifts to more than 4,600 children and 1,700 women living in or associated with 65 shelters and organizations across the city.
“It’s so easy to help,” she said. “I’m just trying [help] people help each other.”
Personalized gifts
Like the real Saint Nick, Bouchard doesn’t work alone – she relies on a crack team of elves to make the toy ride possible every year.
Bouchard’s neighbor Sherri Prazoff is one of her head elves. She began volunteering for the organization seven years ago and is responsible for bringing gifts to about 400 children each year.
“It’s so nice because I’m posting in a lot of different groups now [and] people expect to see my email,” Prazoff said. “You’re just beginning to build this beautiful community of do-gooders.”
And unlike most toy rides, each gift is chosen for a specific child.
Bouchard receives a list of ages and genders of children in need of gifts from each home and organization.
“We give [people] the ability to choose their age and gender and they buy the gift or they send us money via email and we buy the gift on their behalf,” Prazoff said.
The toys cost around $25 and drop-off points are located at several properties in the greater Montreal area, from Longueuil to Blainville to Hudson.
Some shelters even provide Bouchard with an actual children’s wish list detailing the exact toys they’ve asked for.
Although the children’s identities aren’t shared with the donors of the gifts, Bouchard says people appreciate that their donations are being sent directly to a child in need and not just sitting in a warehouse.
“They like being able to vote like a five-year-old woman, and then they go shopping with their little girl, who’s five,” she said. “It’s not just, ‘oh, maybe they need that,’ and you throw it in a big box and you don’t even know if that’s really what they need.”
For Prazoff, the initiative is an easy way to give back during the holidays.
“You don’t know what that little girl or little boy or woman’s life is like right now,” she said. “They’ve been uprooted or are struggling financially … and Christmas could be very stressful.”
“Knowing that we’ve eased that pressure a little… makes my heart happy.”
“The world like us needs you,” says the recipient
Yuphana Kamnuengsuk says the toy ride helped her and her three daughters at a time when things seemed hopeless.
“[It] saved me,” she said. “I don’t have to worry so much about what I’m going to buy for her.”
Kamnuengsuk, an immigrant from Thailand, said she arrived in Montreal in 2013 with limited English or French and a mentally abusive husband who controlled all of her finances.
A messy divorce resulted in her losing her home and, briefly, her children. Then in 2017 she moved to Logifem – a shelter that offers thousands of women and children practical help to escape abuse or crisis situations.
Four years after leaving the shelter, Kamnuengsuk says she and her daughters still receive gifts from Carolyn’s Toy Drive. This year, her children received a makeup kit, a doll, a puzzle, and hair accessories. Kamnuengsuk received beauty products.
“I never bought makeup, I always got it from Logifem,” she laughed.
Kamnuengsuk says Bouchard’s toy drive continues to brighten up their Christmas and has saved many mothers like her from the heartache of not being able to give their children gifts during the holiday season.
“The world like us needs you very much,” she said. “You make our world more colorful and beautiful.”
Not just toys
It may be known for toy rides, but Bouchard does so much more than that, according to Anne Bergeron, communications and volunteers coordinator at Logifem.
“She also provides us with gifts for various occasions throughout the year,” she said.
Whether it’s a couch for a new arrival, a mover to help a refugee relocate, groceries for shelter, or coats for residents throughout the winter – “I ask her and she delivers. It’s incredible,” Bergeron said.
Christella Tchicaya, co-founder of L’acte D’Amour, a home that primarily helps women and children from African countries, says she is overwhelmed by Bouchard year after year.
“She doesn’t want anything in return,” she said. “Even during the year she responds to our needs with food drives, with backpacks in August before school, and during the pandemic she was the first to call us and say, ‘I have masks. Do you guys need masks?’”
“The number of people she helps is incredible.”
With all said and done, Bouchard says she finds the inspiration to continue giving back through her own father, who grew up in an orphanage and never had much — let alone Christmas presents.
“We were spoiled growing up,” she said. “It’s easy for me to keep going.”
