Mountrail County Promoter - Latest News

The Mountrail Community Food Pantry provided 11,708 pounds of food to 114 Mountrail County families in September for a total of 372 people, of which 131 were children and 54 were seniors.
We had fresh garden produce donated to us by area gardeners, 483 pounds of it! Fresh garden produce is such a welcome addition for our clients. Thank you so much to the dedicated gardeners for these beautiful veggies.
Greg, Bill and Danny hauled 3,482 pounds of donated foods from Cashwise in September. Thank you, gentlemen and thank you to Cashwise.
What a month we had! It started off with Chord Energy holding a food drive for us at their company meeting held at Mountrail’s South Complex. They brought us 1,097 pounds of food!! And also, some funds to purchase other groceries. Thank you, Chord Energy and employees!!
Then, we found out we were the very thankful recipients of Veteran’s Gaming Funds from the Five Spot Bar, the Riv, and the Hilltop/City of Ross! What a help these gaming funds are for so many in our community. Thank you to the Five Spot, the Riv, and the Hilltop/City of Ross for choosing us for some of your funds. Thank you to the folks in the background that manage all of these funds, and thank you to the patrons that support these games.
We received several donations throughout the month, honoring the lives of those who have gone Home. We always post those memorials in the Mountrail County Promoter for the families to know that their loved one was honored in this way. The Promoter kindly posts these notices without delay.
About mid-month, I received a phone call from the high school district office. The Stanley High School Student Council had raised funds for our pantry. How very thoughtful! Thank you, Student Council! The Stanley School system has been so supportive of our pantry. Back in the day, when we had a lot of steps to walk up into our pantry, the delivery truck would pull up with pallets of food and set them outside. It was our responsibility to get that food into the building from there. Our days were DEFINITELY brighter when a busload of kids would pull up to our door on truck days! They would hop out, start grabbing boxes and were bounding up those steps like nobody’s business. Our pallets would be emptied quickly, and food was safely placed in the spots we needed it to be. The place sounded like a beehive… buzzing with laughter, fast paced directives being given as to where each box of food would go, and discussions about how to stack boxes and why. It was a lot of fun to have those energetic kids helping us, and a giant relief for the rest of our good-hearted volunteers’ backs and knees not to have to carry all of that heavy food up those steps themselves.
And to finish the month’s news out so perfectly, Vicki from EOG Resources visited our pantry in the morning before we opened and presented us with a giant check! (physically AND monetarily!) What a lovely, lovely surprise!
For years, EOG has actively looked for ways to help our pantry. If you recall, they helped us move out of the Memorial Building for renovation, bringing trailers and muscles, dismantling shelving, and reassembling it all again, packing up freezers and fridges and food, and then they did the same thing helping us move back into the Memorial Building when renovations were completed! They donated and laid to perfection, gravel for our parking area when we were at the CarQuest building. That was a huge undertaking, but they made it seem easy. And when they were done, it looked like a magazine photo! This kept the mud from being tracked in with the wagon tires, and also on people’s shoes. We appreciated this gravel so very much. It made things much nicer for our clients and for us, especially on rainy days. EOG employees have volunteered to help us clean from time to time, washing shelves, scrubbing out fridges and tidying whatever they see might need a little work. They will help us unload trucks when we get our monthly shipments, if someone is available to do so. And every single bit of this is ALWAYS done with THE BEST attitudes and just priceless senses of humor! A person would think that after one of these types of workdays, you would be tired out. But the laughter that rings out every few minutes and the sense of accomplishment everyone feels is actually energizing! We are happy to be successfully done with whatever the project was, of course, but a little sad to see those fun folks drive away!
Okay, back to Vicki and the check that she brought over (you can see a photo of her with the giant check on our Facebook page)! The funds that EOG donated to our pantry this time will help with our holiday foods tremendously. For sure, Thanksgiving and Christmas, and I think it’s possible that some of Easter may be in the works for that, as well. We will see! And a very neat side note is that we purchase our holiday foods from our local grocery store, so the money stays right in our community! We certainly appreciate the care, compassion, and determination to help that EOG Resources and their employees have for those in need. They are truly a godsend to our community, and we are very thankful for them all. Thank you!
If you’d like to follow us, we are on Facebook at Mountrail Community Food Pantry. You will see any announcements we may have, as well as fun pictures, when I remember to take a photo, anyway.
Our hours of operation are 12:30 to 3:00 p.m. on Mondays (except legal holidays). If you or someone you know needs a little help in providing food for their family, please feel welcome to visit our pantry. You won’t find a friendlier greeting anywhere than when you walk through our doors! Lil and Nancy are the best at what they do!! We just ask that folks be here no later than 2:30 p.m. so we can go home by 3:00 p.m. (We have been working to prepare for our clients since 9:30 or so that morning, so we are plenty tired by 3:00!) We are open all Mondays in October and November.
We are extremely thankful that our pantry is able to provide help to so many families in Mountrail County. As you can see from all of the above fun news, that is completely due to the absolutely fantastic support that our pantry receives from the many folks, churches, businesses and organizations that have a soft spot in their hearts for those in need. (As promised, I will provide our address for people that would like to donate in some way. Our physical address is the Memorial Building, 18 2nd Ave SE, Stanley. The door in the southeast corner of the building is ours, if a person would like to drop off food donations, and our mailing address remains the same; 6989 84th Ave NW, Stanley, ND 58784.)
Well, I think it’s safe to say we are officially into Fall. Cooper temperatures, leaves turning from summer green to the oranges, yellows and reds of autumn, hay being hauled home for winter’s feeding, harvest winding down… the brisk air in the morning smells so crisp and clean… I think about the birds migrating to warmer climates, hoping they have safe travels. I marvel at their sense of guidance. Their navigation system is miraculous to me. Tiny creatures, a giant world, and yet they know just where they need to go. And as I ponder this, it is so cozy to know that the same attention-to-every-tiny-detail Navigator that gives these birds what they need to find their way, is also constantly offering us our own unwavering navigation system… all we have to do is listen and trust. He will take care of the rest.
God bless you and keep you… 
Mary