KUNKLE — When a fire company wants to raise money, members hold chicken dinners or breakfasts or carnivals. Here, they add paint.

Last Friday, about 30 people rolled up their sleeves at the Kunkle Social Hall, picked up their brushes and painted trees. On canvas. And everyone went home with a full tummy and some artwork. For about the fifth time, the Kunkle Fire Company hosted an Eat, Drink and Paint Benefit to help company coffers.

“We’ve been doing this for about a year now,” said ambulance chief Dodie Coolbaugh. “We eat, we paint, we have a little wine, and everybody has a good time.”

Coolbaugh said Kari Dodson brought the idea to the fund-raising arm of the fire company, and it was almost immediately added to the list of fund-raising activities. The company also hosts a breakfast the second Sunday of every month, a chicken barbecue and a sit-down chicken dinner.

“We got things started with word-of-mouth and we put it up on social media,” she said. “People came out for the first one and it took off from there.”

The fund-raisers are vital to the company that covers a 70-square-mile area of Back Mountain, said fire chief Jack Dodson.

“We have 47 active members in this company,” Dodson said. “Not everybody is a firefighter. But everybody has a job and every person does his or her job well.”

All the firefighters are volunteers, but the company does have a paid paramedic and emergency medical technician on staff at all hours.

“People often think that a volunteer operation doesn’t need money,” he said. “But we don’t have an income. And we have to keep the equipment running. That means fuel, maintenance, insurance, upkeep on the building, the same kinds of expenses everybody has. We have to have things ready and working when we’re needed.”

Friday’s party got started with the eating part. Volunteers loaded tables in the old one-room schoolhouse with finger foods, crackers and dips and desserts and a cooler with non-alcoholic drinks. Anyone over 21 could bring stronger beverages and most did help their artistic muse with wine or other adult beverages they carried in.

Then, the colorful fun began.

Barbara Sick, who teaches art at the Tunkhannock Area High School, started with a vote from the crowd on which picture they’d like to paint.

“I bring four pictures and let the people decide what they want,” she said. “That means a bit of running for me first, because I can’t prep the paints beforehand, but I want people to take home something they like, not something I tell them they have to do.”

Sick took a few minutes to load blobs of paint onto Styrofoam plates and distributed them around the room. After a few tips on how to work the paints, the “painterly things to do,” Sick demonstrated how to get started with the background and let her “students” get to work.

“Trust the process,” she said. “It will turn out like a painting. It’ll be your own original piece of art, not like your neighbor’s, but your own.”

Some of the painters had done this before and didn’t worry about the results.

“You don’t think you can do it, and suddenly, it’s all there,” said Sally Johnson, of Beaumont, who has a “stack of paintings at home.”

Johnson loves the “creation” part of the process, but likes the social part of the evening, as well.

“Barb makes it a lot of fun,” she said.

Others were the rookies, like Chris and April Higgins, of Harveys Lake.

“I’m not sure I can do this at all,” April said.

Chris put himself in the same category as he took a seat next to his friend, Russ Coolbaugh.

“I’m just here because she made me come,” he said of April. “And, I was told Russ would be here.”

But, like the rest in the room, they picked up brushes and dove in. By the end of the evening, everybody in the room had turned the blank white canvases into paintings of snow-covered pine trees.

Jill Shaw, of Ross Township, summed up the night.

“It’s a night out. The food is fantastic and you can’t beat the price,” she said. “And it helps out the fire company. It’s all good.”

Approximately 30 people participated in the fifth annual Eat, Drink & Paint benefit for the Kunkle Fire Dept. on Jan. 19 at the Kunkle Social Club.
https://www.mydallaspost.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/web1_Paint1.jpg.optimal.jpgApproximately 30 people participated in the fifth annual Eat, Drink & Paint benefit for the Kunkle Fire Dept. on Jan. 19 at the Kunkle Social Club. Tony Callaio | For Dallas Post

Art class instructor Barbara Sick, right, looks over the shoulders of Brittany Masakowski, center, of Harveys Lake, and Dawn Sult, of Shickshinny.
https://www.mydallaspost.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/web1_Paint2.jpg.optimal.jpgArt class instructor Barbara Sick, right, looks over the shoulders of Brittany Masakowski, center, of Harveys Lake, and Dawn Sult, of Shickshinny. Tony Callaio | For Dallas Post

Katie Higgins, left, and Breezy Coolbaugh are busy starting their painting.
https://www.mydallaspost.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/web1_Paint3.jpg.optimal.jpgKatie Higgins, left, and Breezy Coolbaugh are busy starting their painting. Tony Callaio | For Dallas Post

Erica Dymond, of Centermoreland, pours herself a glass of wine prior to the start of an evening of painting.
https://www.mydallaspost.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/web1_Paint4.jpg.optimal.jpgErica Dymond, of Centermoreland, pours herself a glass of wine prior to the start of an evening of painting. Tony Callaio | For Dallas Post

Sally Johnson, of Beaumont, had a great time while painting the evening’s project.
https://www.mydallaspost.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/web1_Paint5.jpg.optimal.jpgSally Johnson, of Beaumont, had a great time while painting the evening’s project. Tony Callaio | For Dallas Post
Fundraiser benefits Kunkle Fire Company

By Gina Thackara

For Dallas Post

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