Pocatello man seeks funds to buy Nativity scenes for families in need 

Tod Krumenacker with some Nativity scenes he has bought through fundraising to donate to families. | Courtesy Tod Krumenacker POCATELLO — A fundraising drive is underway to purchase Nativity sets and donate them to those in need during this Christmas season. Tod Krumenacker of Pocatello said he had the idea about five years ago.  “What I do is I just try to find people who are willing to donate money to help purchase Nativities,” Krumenacker said. “They can either sponsor a Nativity and pick out a Nativity or they can just donate money and then I’ll go pick out Nativities.”   The Nativity scenes are bought from Deseret Book. He typically spends anywhere from $10 to $30 on each one.  “Closer to Christmas, I would say the middle of November or the beginning of December, I will be looking for people who need Nativities,” he said. “So people can nominate families or individuals that they know that might need a Nativity set for their home. Then I just give out these Nativity sets.” One year, he gave out 30 Nativity scenes. This year, he said he hopes to give out even more. “My goal is to get at least $1,000 and then we can get at least 50 Nativity sets,” Krumenacker said.  He told EastIdahoNews.com the reasoning behind providing the Nativity scenes to families. Christmas can be a joyful time of year and for many others it can be a time of stress with money and sadness for multiple reasons. “I remember being stressed one year and having a Nativity on my desk at work and just seeing that Nativity is a reminder to me, the reason that we celebrate the Christmas season,” he said. “It helped me feel better about things. Being able to give people a Nativity that might be struggling for whatever reason at Christmas can just be a reminder of Christ.” Krumenacker recalled a favorite memory from last year. He didn’t give out too many Nativity scenes — he said he donated only a couple and didn’t raise a lot of money — but he said he remembers meeting up with someone to give them a Nativity scene. They were in tears.  “They said it was a rough year. They were just so grateful to have this Nativity to be able to take home,” Krumenacker said. “It was one that they took home to show their kids. It just meant a lot to them to be able to have that. I realized that even though it wasn’t really successful last year in numbers, it was successful because the person that needed it, got it.” The Nativity scene drive has already started and some people have donated. He said he hopes to have all the funds for the Nativity scenes gathered by the middle of November. Krumenacker also gets gift bags for each one with the donations.  If people are interested in donating money, he said they can via Venmo @Tod-Krumenacker and put “Nativity” in the memo or reach out to him by email nativitydrive@gmail.com. The Nativity scenes will be given to people in Pocatello, he added.The post Pocatello man seeks funds to buy Nativity scenes for families in need  appeared first on East Idaho News.
Source: eastidahonews.com