Helping hands: Polson girls spend Thanksgiving at local senior center

For the last five years, Cheyanne and Mariah Corrigan, and Elise and Caitlyn Plaiss have been donating their Thanksgiving to help put on the community dinner in Polson at the Senior Center. The dinner’s coordinator, Tracy, who is also Elise and Caitlyn’s mom, said the dinner has some very dedicated volunteers. What makes these four volunteers special? They range from the age of 11 to 21, and have been helping for multiple years.

Cheyanne, 21, and Mariah, 18, have both been volunteering for the last five years. Their family usually goes hunting on Thanksgiving, and on their first year of volunteering, both girls had their tags filled. Their grandma, who works at the Senior Center, asked them to come help out at the dinner. “We decided to come down and try it, and we’ve been doing it ever since,” Mariah said. Cheyanne said her family has been part of the community for a long time. “It’s nice to see the looks on people’s faces. I like getting to know the older people and hearing their stories... just being part of something bigger,” she said.

The Corrigan family doesn’t really have a thanksgiving dinner, according to the girls. “Even if everyone’s tags are filled, the boys are still out in the woods all day,” Cheyanne said. They do, however, have one request of their mom. “The only thing we ask for is green bean casserole,” Cheyanne said, “And we’ll probably scarf that down after the fact.”

Caitlyn Plaiss is longest running volunteer of the four, even though she’s only eleven years old. She’s been helping for six years. “That’s because I was too young to be left alone at home,” she said. She rode along with her dad as they made dinner deliveries to people throughout the day. Her mom, as the dinner coordinator, is at the Senior Center most of the day. Today, Caitlyn still helps with deliveries. “It’s the best job ever,” she said, “My favorite part of it is making families happy who can’t make it to the Senior Center.”

Her sister, Elise, is fifteen. She’s been helping for five years. “My mom needed help with the dining room, so now I’m kind of the dining room head coordinator,” she said. Her duties include setting up the room and organizing the volunteers who are going to help, among other things. She said she comes back every year because it was a good experience the first time. “I had a lot of fun the first year. For a few years before I was helping my grandma make dinner but then my mom really needed help doing the dining room so I decided to come pitch in. It was a lot of funny making people happy and serving the community.”

The Plaiss girls work all day, then head to their grandma’s house for their thanksgiving dinner. The night before the community dinner, volunteers set up for the events. After that, Caitlyn said, “We sleep like dad people, then wake up ready to work.” So by the time the dinner at the Senior Center is over, everyone is pretty exhausted. “We just sit down on couch at Grandma’s and complain about how much work we did. But really, we’re glad we did it,” Caitlyn said with a smile.