Hockey Canada
The hockey community is known for its propensity to rise to the occasion, to pull up its proverbial socks and do what needs to be done. From players, to parents, to volunteers, to fans … the notion of giving back and getting involved is engrained in the game.
“It’s super important for us [to be involved] because we try to instill good morals for our son, Liam,” says hockey dad Justen McGillis of Angus, Ont. “To get him to understand at an early age that helping others and doing nice things and getting out there and being active in the community is a good thing,”
Now, Justen and Liam are not just pulling up their socks but leveraging the hockey community to collect socks in the name of giving back to the homeless.
Liam, 6, alongside his friend Fynn, 7, led an initiative in November to collect as many pairs of socks as they could. They procured a local sports shop to collect at and were able to solicit donations. They lost count, but guess they collected between 750 and 1,000 socks, enough for six very full garbage bags to donate to Toques from the Heart.