Tag archives: Mistletoe Ball

Honoring Chris Toomey at the Mistletoe Ball
By Richard Mineards   |   December 30, 2025

Written by Maria McCall Catholic Charities’ 33rd Annual Mistletoe Ball, held at Birnam Wood, paid warm tribute to honoree Chris Toomey. Bishop Slawomir Szkredka delivered the invocation and special message from Pope Leo XIV. Martin Bell emceed with his signature charm, opening the program by introducing Irish-born Rev. Maurice O’Mahony with a playful limerick. Father […]

Gift Keeps Giving
By Richard Mineards   |   October 11, 2018

Christmas came early when Chris Toomey threw a pre-Mistletoe Ball pizza party at his Carpinteria aerie, complete with Yuletide carols, for supporters of the Catholic Charities of Santa Barbara, our Eden by the Beach’s oldest social services agency, which helped more than 12,000 people county-wide last year. The festive fete, which has been held at […]

Mistletoe Ball
By Lynda Millner   |   December 21, 2017

The twenty-sixth annual Catholic Charities Mistletoe Ball took over the Biltmore Coral Casino for a night of wining, dining, and dancing. We began on the terrace and ended in the beautiful ballroom totally decorated with the walls draped in forest-green fabric and the ceiling hung with hundreds of peach-colored balloons with silver milar strings. Co-chairs […]

Community Stars
By James Buckley   |   November 23, 2017

Both Erin Graffy de Garcia and her husband, James Paul (Jim) Garcia, will be honored by Catholic Charities at the upcoming 26th Annual Mistletoe Ball at Coral Casino on Friday evening, December 1. The meal will no doubt be excellent, as the food from Four Seasons Biltmore always is, but the real attraction will be […]