Princesses provide birthday shows for kids, donating proceeds to Kamloops hospital

With physical distancing measures still in place, some local businesses have adapted to provide a magical birthday experience to kids stuck at home.

Kamloops' Wishing Well Parties and Events is offering lawn shows and videos during quarantine, featuring singing and storytelling from their Disney princess staff.

"We had to shift focus because our parties are usually in person and we spend a lot of time in close quarters with children and parents," said Paige Danyluk.

Her mother Janet McKay started the business four years ago, and Danyluk plays a princess, along with their staff of 13 actors. 

For lawn parties, the audience stays at least six feet back, while the princess performs songs, answers questions and reads stories for 20 minutes. This option is available over live video chat as well.

The princesses also do personalized videos for children to watch as many times as they want, where they talk to them, perform and read a story. 

During a typical season, almost half the bookings with Wishing Well are community events. However, the majority have been cancelled due to COVID-19.

Danyluk said that over the past week they have noticed a boost in requests for their physical distancing lawn shows and videos for birthdays.  

"It's been different, because we're usually very hands-on, but we do what we can," said Danyluk. "We just want to make sure that kids have a little bit more magic at their birthday party."

In light of the pandemic, the two have decided to give a portion of their proceeds to Royal Inland Hospital in Kamloops.

"We think it's important to give back to RIH for sure, for all they've done for us," said McKay.

As her father has spent a lot of time at RIH with illness, and her husband was treated there for cancer, she feels it is the right place to donate.

"For those people who are risking their lives everyday for us, the least we can do is try to raise some money for them," added Danyluk. 

The women are both sewing masks, bags and scrub caps for the Sew the Curve group in Kamloops, which donates them to the hospital and front-line workers in the Kamloops community.  

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