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Like it or not, memes are a permanent fixture of Social Media. Many are funny, some try to be serious, most just try to spread a little cheer. One such meme suggested action to spread cheer.

“On Christmas Eve at 6pm we are asking everyone to come outside and ring a bell for two minutes to help spread Christmas spirit and to help Santa fly that sleigh. After a tough year, it would be an amazing memory for the kids and communities. End 2020 with a bit of magic, hope and togetherness! Christmas Eve Jingle 2020” Sounds like a simple idea, step outside at 6:00 p.m., ring a bell until 6:02 and go about the rest of your evening. Tami Bertram of Cottage Grove loved the idea so much, that she took action. She did more than that, she took a LOT of action. She started a Facebook group called “Cottage Grove Christmas Eve Jingle 2020”, she ordered jingle bells online, found local businesses willing to give up valuable counter space to stock a basket of bells, free for the taking and is now delivering bells to folks that are unable to get out of their homes to the stores to get a free bell.

This started because a friend of Bertram’s shared the MEME on her page. Bertram saw the image, “It got me thinking about how I can make a difference in our community of Cottage Grove,” Bertram said.

Bertram then shared it to the Cottage Grove Facebook pages. “It just took off; I couldn’t believe it.”

It took off so well that Grove Nutrition and Dennis Brothers Liquors have already agreed to help with the distribution. She is also in talks with a few other local shops to be pickup locations. How many jingle bells did she order? “I ordered over 800 bells online. I wanted to make sure that everybody who wanted some was able to get some,” Bertram said.

The delivery of the bells should have happened on Monday the seventh. In the meantime, aside from being a stay at home mom helping her kids with distance learning, she is busy cutting cords for each of the bells to tie on to them. Her plan is to deliver them this week along with stocking stores with the free bells. When the question turned to the financial side of putting this together, her response was simple, “I don’t think that matters, the point to just to spread as much joy and cheer and Christmas spirit as possible,” Bertram said.

With all that has gone on in 2020 so far, the efforts of Tami Bertram have not gone unnoticed. People on social media are loving the idea and some have been reaching out to help. Some have offered to donate to help cover the costs and Bertram was very thankful for the offers but has politely declined. “This is what I want to do for our community. If people want to help, they can ring the bells on Christmas eve at 6:00 p.m.” she simply stated.

Knowing how the community rallies around ideas like this, it was pointed out there will be some that insist on doing something to help. Bertram just wants as many people out ringing bells as possible. She suggested people get some bells from her and make sure their neighborhood has bells and knows to ring them at 6:00 pm on Christmas Eve. “If people want to help, they can get some bells from me and give them to their neighbors,” Bertram said, “they can do that by reaching out to me on the Facebook Page.”

If you want to order some yourself, she bought hers online through Oriental Trading and the delivery time was about a week.

“It’s been such a rough year for everybody. Everybody is in such a difficult position right now and I truly just want to try to lift the spirits of everybody, especially the kids. Make memories for the kids and hopefully this is the first annual of many of these to come,” Bertram said.

Cottage Grove’s population is just over 37,000 people. Imagine if just half, 18,500 people, stepped outside at 6:00 on Chrismas Eve and rang bells for two minutes. “That would be truly, truly incredible,” Bertram said. “I would be just… flabbergasted.”

The challenge has been issued folks. Get yourself a bell, get your kids a bell, step outside at 5:59 on Christmas Eve and be ready to ring your bell for two minutes. Hopefully there will be some videos of neighborhoods ringing together, physically distanced of course and hopefully we will hear nothing but thousands of bells ringing.