By Jacob Wheeler Back when he was a student at Benzie Central<\/a>, native son Marley Demers got the idea to place Christmas decorations in the school cafeteria. He contacted the food service director, and she approved.<\/p>\n Ever since then, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, Valentine\u2019s, and St. Patrick\u2019s Day have meant family gatherings and delicious meals, and also pumpkins, paper turkeys, pilgrims, Santas, reindeer, evergeens, elves, hearts, leprechauns, and decorated eggs taped to the walls and hanging from the ceilings. When the decorations come down, Demers repurposes them into creative art in \u201cthe clubhouse\u201d on the property of his parents, Marty Jablonski and Betty Demers of Benzonia. <\/p>\n This holiday season, Demers\u2014who turns 28 years old on December 22\u2014is decorating Crystal View Adult Foster Care<\/a> in Frankfort, Resale 4 Recovery<\/a> in Benzonia, and the Groundwork Center for Resilient Communities<\/a> in Traverse City (formerly the Beulah-based Michigan Land Use Institute, or MLUI).<\/p>\n \u201cMarley\u2019s decorations are fantastic, they blow your mind away,\u201d says Crystal View caregiver Judy McGregor. \u201cOur residents really like it! It cheers them up a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n Demers gets his decorations donated from big-box retail stores in Northern Michigan. He does not charge for the displays, but he leaves a donation box at each location.<\/p>\n \u201cI recognize that it\u2019s a bit unusual for a nonprofit advocacy organization to go all out on holiday decorations. But we figured, \u2018Hey, let\u2019s not take ourselves so seriously and have a little fun with the holidays,\u2019\u201d says Hans Voss, Groundwork\u2019s executive director, a former Elberta resident. \u201cPlus, Marley is a real pro. I call him the \u2018Holiday Decoration Artist,\u2019 because he really has a special talent and does a terrific job of transforming our regular hallway into a full-on seasonal celebration.\u00a0Marley is a legit artist\u2014and a heck of a dedicated young man.\u00a0He is following his passion, and it\u2019s beautiful to witness.\u201d<\/p>\n For the last 10 years, Demers has also made and sold Christmas wreaths. He uses Benzie County\u2019s freshest evergreens and typically sells 100 to 150 of them. They cost between $25 and $35, depending on the wreath.<\/p>\n Every step of the way, the community has supported Demers in his creative pursuits.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen Marley was growing up in Benzie, his family and friends supported his pursuits without question,\u201d Voss says. \u201cI was a soccer coach at the time and tried to get him to play soccer, but he was interested in making Christmas wreaths, so I bought a Christmas wreath. That\u2019s one of the great things about the Benzie community; they really gather around people and support them. Another one of Marley\u2019s passions, which he picked up from his parents, is Michigan music festivals\u2014it seems he\u2019s a volunteer for all the great local festivals, and he really loves it. He\u2019s following his dreams, and it\u2019s a real inspiration.\u201d<\/p>\n
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