By Leicester Mercury | Posted: 17 September, 2014
A new foundation is being set up in memory of a fundraiser who passed away this year.
Chris East, of Wigston, spent the last 24 years helping local and national charities raising money, including annual Children in Need events at her home.
She raised tens of thousands of pounds in recent years, including nearly £9,000 for the LOROS hospice in Leicester through her “Tea at 3” parties.
She also worked hard making cards, gifts and other crafts to sell at charity shops and fundraising events, including the annual sponsored walk for Menphys.
Her friend and fellow Wigston fundraiser Linda Boulter said: “Chris excelled in making unique crafts and beautiful cards for all occasions and she and her husband, Brian, could be seen at many fundraising events selling her crafts and cards and giving to local charities.
“She could turn her hand to anything.
“She was also known to take her items to local charity shops in Wigston where they were gratefully received.
“She managed the Multiple Sclerosis charity shop in Leicester for several years, making and donating many of her craft items to be sold in the shop.”
Chris battled cancer in 1999, when she was given chemotherapy to help her fight off the disease.
But two years ago she was diagnosed with cancer again and she passed away earlier this summer, aged 66, leaving her husband Brian and daughter Charlotte.
The new charity foundation will be formed out of a small, informal fundraising group called Wigston Friends of Local Charities that Linda and her husband, Bill, are involved in.
Linda said she hoped some more of Chris’s friends would join them and the group would do various fundraising activities for the charities Chris supported during her life.
Mary Burdett, who also lives in Wigston, helped Chris with her annual Christmas tea parties.
She said: “She was a lovely person and I would love to see something like this happening in her name.
“I knew Chris for at least 30 years and she worked so hard.
“She would spend the whole year planning and preparing for the tea parties and we would raise lots of money that would be split between charities like Loros, Cancer Research, Macmillan, Coping with Cancer, the air ambulance and the children’s ward at Leicester Royal Infirmary.”
Christian Weikert-Picker, from the LOROS fundraising department, said: “Chris was a very gentle lady with a great team of friends who supported her fund raising efforts.
“Their fundraising for LOROS began in 2000 with her interests in crafts, quiz’s, making cups of tea and a good old fashioned chat.
“The Wigston Support group with help from Linda Boulter held many Tea at 3 events, with donated goods, crafts and cards raising substantial funds for the Hospice.
“Her ideas help to raise in excess of £9,000 for the Hospice, we are truly grateful for all her hard work and for the many years she opened her home to spread the work of the charity, she will be missed.”
