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In 2010, when Father David Whiteside was sent to build the new church, he knew that the first task would be raising the funds needed. He asked parishioners to make a 5-year pledge and set the example by making the first pledge himself. However, he knew that we would also need additional support from the community to reach our goals. He set a kickoff fundraiser call the "Hoedown" in November of 2011. The Hoedown was so successful, it spawned a series of fundraisers ending in "down". We've had Get Downs, Show Downs, Chow Downs, Snow Downs and Dough Downs. The Dough Downs continue to this day as the volunteer baking group, The Bread of Life Bakers.
Mary Beth Watson and Theresa Sondag, along with some of Theresa's family members, had operated the bakery Liz Marie's Recipes in Manito from 2000-2010. Elizabeth Juraco, Theresa's mother, had learned how to make povitica from her Croatian mother-in-law. So Elizabeth had passed this recipe on to her children. This favored recipe was the specialty of Liz Marie's Bakery. They shipped loaves throughout the United States and even to other countries while they were in operation! Liz Marie's closed, but Theresa and Mary Beth had a list of customers. They knew there was a provitica shortage that needed to be filled. So with many volunteers and a strong sense of client loyalty from the bakery, they decided to make provitica for the holidays. That event became the first Dough Down!
This was an entirely volunteer effort, so those volunteers were key to the success of the baking. Some of them had prior experience at the bakery. While many had no large scale baking experience, but were more than willing to help. The running joke is that they are the best workers money can't buy! The Dough Down was so successful that it eventually became part of the financial plan for building the church.
In 2012, our bakers started out by making 400-500 loaves of povitica at Manito Foods, a local grocery. In 2013, they produced 1,400 loaves. In 2014, they baked 1,800 loaves in only 11 days using the kitchen of the Ironstone Room in Manito. Baking started late in 2015, because the new church kitchen was still being completed and the oven had to be moved to the church. But The Bread of Life Bakers were still able to complete 1,800 loaves to sell for the Christmas season. Often on the long days of povitica baking, workers have been treated to a delicious lunch catered by Herb Collins. This monumental group effort has been critical to the financial support of the church.