Hancock Lumber and the Maine Sustainable Forestry Initiative teamed up to help make a Maine girl’s Make-A-Wish dream come true! Scott Pease, Procurement Forester, at Hancock Lumber sits on the executive committee for the SIC (Maine SFI Implementation Committee) here in Maine and helped orchestrate this donation. The two organizations rallied to get involved and donate materials and labor to make Alice Skiff’s dream a reality.
Representatives of the Maine Sustainable Forestry Initiative and Make-A-Wish Maine, family, and friends stand with Alice Skiff (in doorway) outside her she shed. (Johanna Neeson/ Lincoln County News photo)
Hancock Lumber’s donation included all the pine for the project from the Pittsfield mill which included the interior walls, trim, and painted exterior. Hancock also helped out by providing discounted windows, as well as Scott’s time to build the shed with the SFI group.
When Make-A-Wish Maine partnered with the Maine Sustainable Forestry Initiative to make Alice’s dream a reality they first completed a small model shed. Then, over two weeks, they built the “she shed” in pieces for transportation and assembly at Alice’s home. In an interview with the Bangor Daily News Alice commented, “This is amazing and perfect and all that I wanted. It matches the image in my head.”
The finished shed is 12 x 16 with many bells and whistles – a loft, projector screen, two beds, a couch, and a kitchenette and bathroom area that could make it a completely livable tiny home. Diagnosed with a medulloblastoma brain tumor under her cerebellum in October 2016, Alice underwent emergency surgery to remove the tumor. After six weeks of radiation and a year of chemotherapy, today Alice is cancer-free. She returns for full MRIs every three months.
This isn’t the first time Hancock Lumber and the Maine Sustainable Forestry Initiative have worked together to help a Make-A-Wish dream come true. Last September, the two groups collaborated to help make a Bridgton boy’s wish a reality.
Thank you, Scott Pease, the Maine Sustainable Forestry Initiative, and Make-A-Wish for the great work you’re doing in our communities!