Jollyes Collection

Today was the collection for Jollyes all across Northern Ireland.

At about 10 o’clock I was picked up. The person who picked me up even disabled the airbag for Ushi! I thought that was really thoughtful.

We first let Ushi see if she needed a busy, but she was more interested in sniffing the air and doing anything but busy lol. So we took her on in. Of course she wanted to rush a bit. (She seems to do this if she’s been in a car for some reason). I discovered that there was a table sitting full of stuff we were selling, as well as seats for us. I thought we’d be standing for the two hours that I was collecting. Thank god we weren’t!

I kept Ushi’s harness on for about 10 minutes just until she settled down and that. There was me, the branch organiser, the lady who drove me up, her daughter, the treasurer, and another volunteer. (Those three didn’t arrive until about 11ish). Here a guide dog owner should never be unaccompanied. This is so that the bucket doesn’t get stolen or anything horrible like that.

On the table we had little note books, rulers, pens, cuddley guide dogs, keyrings, a writing set I think with a pen, ruler, note book and rubber all in one, and a tombola. Oh and the collection bucket itself lol.

I was panicking in case they thought that I had stole a nylabone as I had braught Ushi hers in case she got bored, but no one even noticed I don’t think.

Lots and lots of people started coming up at different points to talk to Ushi, and just to come over really.

There was one point where there was someone outside with an Airdale? I think that’s what they are called. It had a really nasty bark. I thought it was going to come in, so I promptly got up and walked back a bit. Luckily the dog didn’t come in, so I could sit down again which was good. I didn’t know dogs could come into Jollyes, but that must be the case. (Our jollyes doesn’t have any animals apart from fish).

The Royal Cannin dog food company were there too, as well as someone from the training dog club or something.

The woman from the Royal Cannin braught her dog in who was a border colly. He was called “Blue”. Ushi and him had a little roll around the floor lol. (It wasn’t for long, and i still had her lead. I had taken her harness off at this point). She also had a little play with a little 12 week old puppy called “Alphy”. (I didn’t let her play that long with both dogs).

Apart from the dogs, she lay down like a good girl and chilled. I needn’t have worried about her getting bored as there were that many people coming up and telling her what a good girl she was lol.

It was 10 % off everything in the store for today too. We didn’t sell much of our stock, but we did get quite a few donations. (All the money was going through Jollyes anyway to us, but it just meant that our actual branch didn’t get as much as if the whole store donated directly to us).

The collection ran until 5 I think. Maybe later on that day more people came round.

It was easier than I thought. We basically had to sit and look pritty really. (Ushi did a fab job of doing that lol).

I would like to thank the staff at Jollyes for all their help today. Especially for providing the comfy cat beds for us to cushion our bums! (We were sitting on really hard chairs lol. We happened to mention amongst ourselves how uncomfortable they were. One of the staff then came and gave us each a nice little cat bed to sit on!).

I hope all collections are this easy! I’ll let you know how much we raised later, or whenever I find out lol. Thanks again Jollyes!

---