Festival of Trees leads lineup of upcoming events

Emotions help fuel the annual Festival of Trees that benefits Primary Children's Medical Center. It's a matter of giving back to an institution that keeps on giving.

Andrea Carbine, a 28-year-old mother of three, is working on a tree for this year's festival, which will be Nov. 29-Dec. 2 at the South Towne Expo Center.

She wants to contribute something to the medical center that has helped her young family. All three of the Carbine children have spent time at Primary. Doctors believe that Rhett, 7, may have a genetic disorder. He has been to Primary for various surgeries and other procedures. Nikole, 4, was born with a heart murmur that hopefully she will grow out of, said her mother. In the meantime, Nikole visits a cardiologist every year at the medical center to be monitored.

Baby Gavin, 16 months, had surgery on his head to correct a problem with his skull.

This will be the first tree Andrea's done for the festival. "I'm hoping I can do it every year, because the hospital has done so much for my family," she said.

There were times when the hospital filled the gap that the family's insurance wouldn't cover.

For example, the insurance company deemed one of Rhett's surgeries to be experimental and therefore wouldn't foot the bill. "The hospital wrote off about $100,000," Andrea said. Her family simply didn't have the money to pay for it.

"It's hard having a child with medical needs, being able to make sure they get everything they need on top of day-to-day living."

Primary Children's Medical Center has taken care of other procedures, as well. "They absorbed the cost of a chromosome study that the insurance initially said they would cover and they backed out again," said Andrea.

Her tree, for which she is getting a little help from her friends (and her family, we might add), is a potpourri of design ideas.

Andrea's mother, Chelane Rietbrock, made fabric ornaments shaped like Christmas trees; there are button wreaths and cinnamon sticks with wooden figurines. Ribbon cascades down from the tree's top. Wooden gingerbread people stand near the tree.

Underneath it all will be interactive gifts that are meant to provide projects a family can do together: a kit for making felt mouse ornaments; a kit for a fleece Christmas-tree pillow; decorated Mason jars filled with goodies; and more. Andrea's hoping these projects will encourage the family that buys the tree to spend time together.

It seems that it takes a village to create this tree.