The Sheep River Health Trust's (SRHT) Avenue of Trees is back for its 11th year.

Each year, local businesses and organizations donate a decorated tree to be auctioned off for the health trust, each with a unique theme.

Some trees are designated "Trees of Hope," and locals can donate $500 to have the tree donated to a local family.

Proceeds go to the SRHT, which funds health and wellness projects in the Foothills.

Christine Oakes, fundraising and communications with the SRHT says as always, there's lots of creativity on full display.

"People are so creative, and every year they come up with a different theme. We have the Foothills Family Medical Centre who donated the tree that looks more like a tent with a little campfire, which is called 'A Cozy Christmas,' to me it looks like a great reading nook... From The Eagle, we have a Taylor Swift tree, 'Merry Swiftmas,' and there's a post that comes with it, and on the back, you can see how the ornaments are personalized to Taylor Swift... We have a Charlie Brown Tree with all the characters underneath the tree, they were hand drawn by the folks at Benjamin Moore."

She recalls a particularly heartwarming story behind the Rotary Club of Okotoks' tree.

"They did a very classic tree, and I think part of that has to do with the fact that they had an exchange student with them this year from Thailand. She came with them to decorate the tree, and she'd never decorated a Christmas tree before, she had never had that experience. So that was wonderful, the Rotary Club gave her a bit of Canadian Christmas."

They also received a Christmas dollhouse donation, which also appears in the auction.

All of the trees are on display at the Okotoks Best Western Plus, both in the front lobby and the Heritage room.

Along with the auction and Trees of Hope, Oakes says locals can partake in the fan favourite vote.

"You'll be able to see all of our trees in a Facebook album and you can vote for your favourite and you can also do that at the hotel, we have ballots at the front reception desk. The winner of that contest receives a $250 gift card from Sobeys, and that gift card can be given to whatever charity you like. We try to get a lot out of this event, and we usually do, where we can help a lot of people, not just ourselves."

The auction site is live as of this week, and bidding closes on December 17.

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