Last year, we at Hills of Peace Lutheran Church, Kamloops, launched our first ever Winter Fair—an event planned as both a fundraiser and a community outreach. We set up tables for 19 vendors and had an additional table for our Piecemaker’s Sewing and Quilting group to sell their creations. We also ran a concession, a bake sale, a Santa photo booth, and turned the Sunday school area into a Kid Zone. Volunteers provided live Christmas music. The Fair was so successful that we decided to make it an annual event, and we had our second Winter Fair planned for November 22, 2025.
We did face one issue, however. Last year, our bake sale was augmented by a donation of 40 pies from a local small business. They were a popular item, and we wanted to repeat that this year, but hesitated to ask for another donation. One of our committee members suggested we make our own pies, and out of that suggestion came the idea for a church Pie Making Bee. It was endorsed by the members of our ad hoc Event Committee, and a “Queen Bee” was appointed to organize the event. Our plan was to make as many as fifty apple pies to sell at the Winter Fair.
Our Event Committee members, two congregation volunteers, and our “Queen Bee” shopped for apples, baking supplies, pie plates, twist ties, gloves, hairnets, packaging and cardboard flats for storing the pies and we borrowed miscellaneous supplies such as bowls, apple peelers and rolling pins. Then we put out a sign-up sheet asking for volunteers to help make the pies. Our “Queen Bee,” Biruta, calculated the amounts needed to create approximately fifty pies, and organized the Pie Making Bee into stations, assigning volunteers to each one.
The Bee was planned for Oct. 17–18. Five members of the congregation met on the Friday to make 17 “loaves” of pastry, which went into the fridge to cool overnight. Then, 19 congregation members met on Saturday morning to make pies. Nine showed up at 9 a.m. to open the church and set out everything needed to make the pies, including the 108 pounds of Spartan apples. The apple peelers arrived next and set to work peeling the apples. As our other volunteers arrived, they took to their stations. The second group settled in to remove any left-over peels and cut the apples into small pieces. The pastry “loaves” were moved from the fridge into the kitchen to warm up, then given to our dough cutter who cut the loaves into chunks and weighed out the appropriate amount needed for each pie. The cut apples went to the volunteers at the next station to be weighed into designated amounts and have the sugar, cinnamon and salt added. The weighed pastry and apples were then passed on to our pastry rollers, and the line was in production. Finished pies went to the crimping table to be crimped, bagged, and labelled with cooking instructions. Within an hour we were turning out pies at an excellent rate. The first 32 pies were delivered to two parishioners’ homes to be immediately frozen.
We faced a small crisis when it turned out we had more apples and dough than we had pie plates and bags, so a parishioner made a quick trip to the local dollar store to purchase more of each, and after only a short lull in production, the line was moving again. By noon that day we surprised ourselves by turning out 75 unbaked pies. Sixteen more pies were picked up by congregation members and those that hadn’t already gone into freezers were taken home by our “bees.” The unbaked pies were to be kept frozen until they could be sold at our Winter Fair. This was a fun event for everyone who participated, and we hope that the sale of the pies will bring in some needed funds for our church and grace many Christmas tables in our local community.
—Lynette Leach
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