SS Catering Assistant, Sheryl Smorthit, loves to fundraise and give back to her local community and charities. Her latest fundraising project is a Letters to Heaven post box which has just been installed at Park Wood Crematorium in Elland.
The Letters to Heaven post box allows individuals and families to send letters, drawings thoughts and cards to their loved ones who have died. It's a way to help people cope with grief and the loss of a loved one. The post box will be serviced by the crematorium. The post is never opened and everything deposited in the post box remains confidential.
Sheryl saw the idea on social media at the beginning of this year. She did some research to see if this initiative was already in her community, but found that it wasn't. She decided to start a fundraising mission to raise money for a post box to be installed in her local crematorium for her community because she felt it was something that could benefit a lot of people in the area.
Through various fundraising projects, she managed to raise enough money and the post box has now been installed.
Sheryl said: "My mother in law died in May. There was a lot of sadness in the family at the time. When I saw the Letters to Heaven idea on my socials, I thought Elland crematorium hasn’t got one and I wanted to give it one.
"I just think for kids especially, they'll actually believe it's going up there. It's a way for them to share the drawings or cards they want to give. It's a bit of peace for adults as well. People can share their news and writing your thoughts down sometimes is a big thing."
The crematorium will open the box each Monday, leaving the letters unopened and confidential. Once they have enough they will offer a gentle cremation process and scatter the ashes in the gardens of remembrance.
