Photo provided
Thanksgiving meals are stacked at the Sandy Hook United Methodist Church kitchen in preparation for delivery by More Than a Meal volunteers.
More than 1,000 Bartholomew County residents will have a Thanksgiving meal delivered to them this year by the More Than a Meal program.
Since 2020, Columbus resident and owner of Columbus Carpet Sarah Humphrey, her family and several volunteers have prepared and delivered Thanksgiving meals. What started as a simple Facebook post has now evolved into an all day project where volunteers gather at Sandy Hook United Methodist Church to feed hundreds of people.
To volunteer or donate to More Than a Meal, visit the program’s Facebook page. Meals will be prepared and delivered on Wednesday.
The program started from Humphrey wondering how many people weren’t going to have a Thanksgiving meal due to the pandemic, the economy or job loss. She put a post on Facebook the week before Thanksgiving saying she would deliver parts of her family’s Thanksgiving meal to whoever needed it, thinking she would only get a few responses.
“… my husband came home from work and I was like, ‘hey, so I did a thing,’ and he’s like, ‘you what?,’” Humphrey said. “He’s like, ‘what are you going to do if we get a hundred people wanting Thanksgiving meals?’ And I’m like, ‘I guess we’ll cook a hundred Thanksgiving meals, I don’t know.’ I’m like, ‘God’s going to provide, like he always does. It’ll be fine.’”
That year, out of their own kitchen, she and her family ended up serving 176 meals to 51 families around Bartholomew County.
“It was truly, like, just all hands on deck,” Humphrey said. “It was amazing, it was chaotic, it was beautiful.”
Seeing that there was a need, Humphrey decided to make it an annual program. Sandy Hook United Methodist Church members and its pastor Paul Dazet also extended a partnership to them to allow them to use the church’s kitchen, sanctuary and fellowship hall to meet the needs of more people.
They also partnered with the Bartholomew County Public Library to provide meals to those who could be experiencing homelessness and not have an address to deliver to. Humphrey said they delivered about 92 meals last year to the library and are looking at more than 50 people signed up this year through the library’s sign up sheet.
“These people are often the most forgotten in our society, and we don’t want to forget them on Thanksgiving when they spend most of their time already being forgotten by society,” Humphrey said.
As of this week, over 1,130 people have signed up to receive meals through the program, exceeding the previous highest amount of 846 meals from 2022. Humphrey attributes this higher total to a few reasons, including the government shutdown causing some to lose their benefits and paychecks, job loss and higher grocery costs.
No matter the reason, Humphrey said they just need to show up and love these people the best way she knows how — by keeping their stomachs full.
“People can do a lot better in life if they’re fed, so that’s what we’re trying to do,” Humphrey said.
The program serves all the staples of a Thanksgiving meal including turkey, stuffing, potatoes, green beans, cranberry relish and pumpkin pie. A good portion of their donations come from Sandy Hook members and the church’s annual Sponsor-a-Turkey drive, where people can sponsor a turkey for $20, but donations also come from family, friends and the community.
Humphrey said they also partner with local businesses such as Arby’s, which donates portion cups and lids to put gravy and other items in. As donations are down this year, she said they are trying to shop smart, but Kroger has been very helpful and has allowed them to buy turkeys at sale prices.
“That was a huge help to be able to get because the turkeys and the pies are always our biggest cost,” Humphrey said. “And so to get turkeys at such a great cost this year, especially with the cost of food being as high as it is right now, that was a huge break for us this year.”
The morning of, Humphrey and her husband arrive early to set up several tables before the cooks arrive, who come in throughout the morning based on their task. By the time everything’s cooked, the meal packers have arrived to put food items into containers.
The meal packers take the containers to the baggers team who bag it up and put them on tables, which are labeled with the families, how many meals they get and a driver number. By that time, drivers have arrived, car loaders have given them their meals to deliver and drivers have been given their instructions. Humphrey said she groups nearby addresses together to make sure drivers aren’t going back and forth across town.
“And at the end, the whole room is full of tables piled full of bags and it looks kind of crazy, but it just runs super smoothly,” Humphrey said. “It’s just a big old assembly line.”
The entire day can last over 12 hours depending on how long clean up is afterwards. As of this week, about 94 people have signed up to volunteer for the program, but Humphrey said they usually get a few more in the days leading up to their preparation and delivery date.
“It’s a little bit lower than I would like for it to be, but I also know that we have rock star volunteers on this list, we have a lot of new people on this list who I know are showing up just full of drive, ready to love on their neighbors and rock this thing out,” Humphrey said. “I know we’re going to be fine regardless of what the number ends up being.”
To increase visibility of the program to people who might not have a need but want to help, Humphrey said she focused on advertising to small business groups and Facebook groups including Chowdown Columbus. Doing so not only shared it with someone who may need a meal, but also to people who want to volunteer or donate, she said.
“… there’s so many people in need, this year especially, but I’ve noticed that there’s also so many people who want to help and they just don’t know where’s a good place to help, like where do I start?,” Humphrey said. “So I’ve been trying to kind of point people in our direction a little bit more this year.”
