On December 1st, I posted some pictures on my blog showing my friend Sharon "Shaz" Vrecko's Christmas decorations in her Cloverdale home.
We have volunteered together at Canada Post doing Letters to Santa for many years. Shaz (as her friends call her) answered all the mail from schools in Surrey we received. That's a huge job! She has four grown sons and lost her husband to cancer many years ago. Both Shaz and her late husband were Canada Post employees. The picture below was taken on Tuesday when she dropped off all the Santa mail she'd done at home. Shaz was on her way to the hospital where one son works, to give home made treats to the staff and cheer to the patients. She's a great friend and an marvelous person.
The Cloverdale Reporter visited her home last week and published a wonderful article in this week's paper that I've posted below!
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| Her shoes have a lot of bells and you can always tell when she's in the building! |
It began to look a lot like Christmas back in October for one Cloverdale woman.
Known as “The Christmas Lady,” Cloverdale’s Sharon Vrecko transforms her house into a Christmas wonderland every year. She has so many decorations, and she fills every room in her house, that she has to start in October so she’s ready by Dec. 1. “I wait until the last week (of November) to put up the tree,” Vrecko explained.
The Christmas Lady said her upbringing inspired her to provide a higher level of Christmas cheer for her family and friends. She was brought up in foster homes and although she ended up with some great families in time, she remembers in her younger days she had nothing and longed for a regular holiday season. “I didn’t have Christmas and that. So, I swore that if I ever had my own family, there was going to be Christmas.” And Christmas she did. Vrecko transformed her childhood pain into a lifelong love affair with Christmas joy—spreading the love of the giving season by opening her heart and her doors to others.
At the height of her decorating days, she was opening her house up for public tours and taking in donations for charity. She’d come full circle by giving back to those in need. Vrecko first made Christmas decorations a big deal around the house in 1967, the year she got married, keeping the promise she made to herself in her youth. She started small, but added and added and added over the years until she eventually earned her moniker.
“I’ve cut down a lot,” The Christmas Lady said, now 80. “Because of my age and my hip and back, I can’t do it anymore. And my kids wouldn’t let me climb a ladder, because I need a hip replacement.” She said she loves seeing people’s reactions when they visit.
