Greetings everyone, October is here! Gone are the long summer months of 100-degree weather. I don’t know about everyone else, but I am so thankful to be in the throes of fall and away from that relentless heat. Football is in full swing, I’m certain I smell pumpkin spice everywhere I go, and the trees have begun their progression towards abundant color. We have wrapped up one of our larger fundraisers for our new building expansion project: the Swashbuckler’s Ball (Sept. 21). Many hours were spent in preparation for this event and every one of our volunteers gave endless time to make sure no detail was missed. The Swashbuckler’s Ball featured the popular LakeBoys and this event, while raising money for the new building, also served as a final farewell to former Executive Director Dave Tosch. I suspect that he is currently resting in Arizona with his feet up and his eyes closed. It has been strangely quiet around the senior center without him.
There is no rest for the weary, though, and our fundraising committee is hard at work planning the next big event this winter. Keep your ear to the ground so you don’t miss anything! We are looking forward to an ice cream social in December and a barn dance sometime early next year. There are many more ideas swirling around so there should be something for everyone to take part in. All of these efforts are bringing us closer to our $400,000 fundraising goal, and we are currently nearing the $200,000 mark. Thank you to everyone for helping to make this dream a reality. Speaking of volunteers, every year the Chelan-Douglas Community Action Council and AmeriCorps honors those in our community who serve tirelessly wherever there is a need. This year’s Annual Volunteer Recognition event will be held in the Social Hall on Thursday, October 17th from 2:00 to 3:30. There will be door prizes, raffle gifts and certificates, refreshments, desserts, and socializing. If you are a volunteer, we would love to celebrate you and say thank you for all you do. Please RSVP at 509-662-6156, ext. 254. Our new Program Director, Lydia Agidius, has been hard at work since late summer and I hope everyone is getting a chance to meet her. You will find her in her office planning new trips, or darting around the Social Hall at lunchtime making sure everyone gets a hot plate of food at their table. She is asking for suggestions for future trips so if anyone has a dream vacation in mind, make sure she hears from you. If you would like more information about upcoming trips already in the works, please join her and Liz from Premier World Discovery for a meeting in the Social Hall on Oct. 3 at 1 p.m. As a side note regarding trips, there continue to be questions asked as to why we are no longer doing day trips. This is something many of our members are missing and there has been a great effort to get this reestablished. However, the cost of transportation has skyrocketed and a trip to a baseball game or to the casinos has nearly tripled in price. We are simply unable to create an affordable day trip at this time, although we continue to search for new ideas to bring this back to our members. With summer in our rear-view mirror, we are looking forward to our annual fall events and this will include the Holiday Gift Fair. There is an enormous amount of work involved in putting this popular event together but it is an event you won’t want to miss. The entire Social Hall and several areas at Foothills Middle School are filled with crafts and gifts of every kind. We are hoping to increase the size of the event this year by adding more space at Foothills to make this the largest ever craft fair in the history of the senior center. If you are interested in reserving a space to sell your wares, contact Lydia for more details. Mark your calendars for Saturday, Nov. 9 and start making your Christmas list. I’ll see you there! It is also the time of year when we begin preparing for our annual Christmas Cottage in the Second Chance Thrift Shop. It may seem a little early, but it opens in conjunction with the Holiday Gift Fair on Nov. 9. All of the Christmas items (ornaments, decorations, collectibles and more) need to be in their places by this date, so there will be a little chaos as we juggle moving things in and out of the Thrift Shop. There will be a three-week closure of Suite B starting Oct. 23 and all of the normally scheduled programs in that room will be cancelled or moved to another available location. Please bear with us during this short transition. Fall is also flu shot season and I have had many questions as to whether we are going to have flu shots available to our members again this year. Requests for this service are made through a local pharmacy and typically it just requires a little coordination to make this happen. This year, however, the request has to be made through the corporate office and I am currently waiting for their approval and available dates. Keep watching the senior center website or our Facebook page for updates on this. Thank you to everyone for making my first two months as your new Executive Director a warm and welcoming experience. I appreciate every one of you! ~ Lisa Blair |
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