BUCKHANNON – The Upshur County Parish House is now accepting donations for their second annual Easter basket distribution.

Director of the Upshur County Parish House Kristi Wilkerson said this marks the second year the Parish House has organized an Eastertime distribution.

“We are collecting instant mashed potatoes or boxed scalloped potatoes, canned vegetables of any kind and brownie mix,” Wilkerson said. “Thanksgiving and Christmas baskets are very well-established, but Easter is a little bit more flexible, so everybody will get potatoes of some kind, vegetables of some kind, and some kind of dessert. Somebody might get peas, and somebody else might get carrots or something, but everybody gets those items, and we’ll be doing ham again.”

The Parish House received a generous donation that will cover the ham for 2022.

“It starts Saturday, April 9, and that’s curbside and then it continues Monday through Thursday of the following week, so the 11th to the 14th. They would need to come to the Parish House on a weekday,” Wilkerson said. “During the week, it’s 9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. and then on [April] 9th, it is 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.”

The Parish House decided to start offering Easter baskets this spring to help the community celebrate Easter.

“We are a faith-based organization, so this gives us an opportunity to share our faith with our neighbors in need,” Wilkerson said. “The second reason was folks telling us they’re often able to make ends meet month-to-month, but when it comes time for a holiday, it’s more expensive food than what they would normally buy, and that really does strain their budget more than they can handle, and we know that providing holiday food boxes really helps a number of our neighbors, so we wanted to offer a spring option.”

Food pantry guidelines apply for all holiday food boxes, and anyone with questions may call the Parish House at 304-472-0743.

“The general pantry can use canned beans, so black beans, pinto beans, kidney beans, Great Northern [beans], grape jelly and then we’ve had a lot of requests lately for hygiene products, so shampoo, deodorant — things like that any of that would be great,” Wilkerson said.

You can find the Parish House, located at 68 College Ave., on Facebook or click here for more information.