This week began on Saturday, when the Women of the Williamsburg Moose Lodge held their fabulous golf tournament! The Arc and The AoA benefit from the proceeds (along with Moose Charities), and we are grateful for their support!
It was a beautiful Saturday morning as Lisa, Carol, Alexis, Liz, Devin, Pam, and Andy came to help the WOTM in what was a successful tournament day! After everyone checked in and the putting contest was over, we headed to our assigned holes and spent the morning greeting the players and thanking them for their support.
Alexis worked the 18th hole with Shelly from the Moose Lodge. All the teams had to stop by their cart and pay extra to move on to the 18th hole! The teams generously dug into their pockets so they could "move up." We are thankful!
Devin and Carol worked on the 2nd hole. When this team was ready for someone to putt, they gave Devin a shot! He came soooo close! All of the golfers were friendly and fun to talk to, and they all said they wouldn't have missed supporting this tournament for anything!
Liz and Lisa worked at the 17th hole. Here's Liz with her dad, Greg, who put a team together and played on Saturday. Yes, we are grateful for them, too! Liz is very proud of her dad, and she should be. His tee off for our hole was one of the best we saw all day, and landed on the green not too far from the pin!
When Patti's team came to the 17th hole, she took the time to give Liz some pointers on putting. That's how AWESOME Patti is!! Her patience and excellent tips worked...look how close Liz was to getting the ball in the hole! Of course, she got good golf genes from her dad, too! Patti, and the ALL of the WOTM, we thank you from the bottom of our hearts for all the hard work you put into this tournament. It means so much to us to have your love and support!
Laura's family was out of town, but they sponsored a hole and we are grateful for their support! Thank you, Palmer Family.
More to be thankful for, as Kevin's family (also traveling) sponsored a hole, too! Many thanks to the MacMasters family!
We had a lot of fun at the tournament. There are so many to thank, including Kingsmill Resort and a number of other sponsors. But most of all, we thank our dear friend Patti, for galvanizing her WOTM friends and dedicating a lot of time and effort to this event. It means a lot to us!
Before we get to our regular week, we're going to go ahead and put the information about The Williamsburg Landing 5K for The Arc here for your convenience.
This is our 10th annual 5K, and we have high hopes that it will be special. This is our largest fundraiser each year, and we need lots of support, both in sponsorships and participants!
Our wonderful Arc clients deserve the best programming we can offer, so, please consider donating if you can, and know that we are deeply appreciative of your support!
We kicked off our regular week on Tuesday, with a beautiful day for a Pool Party! We headed to Sam's pool for our 4th annual fun time, and everyone was stoked. A few of the guys got in, but next thing we knew, the lifeguards were running us out of the water! Wait...why?! Well, the power went out and the pump stopped running! Apparently, swimming is not allowed in a big pool of water if the pump isn't running, so we gathered in the shade and waited patiently. The power would surely come back on very soon! Here we are, waiting patiently!
After about a half an hour, we enjoyed the very delicious sub sandwich picnic that Coach Teri provided. We talked about what we could do if the power didn't come back on, and not too long after eating, the power did come back on! HOWEVER, the pump still wasn't working...so we had no choice but to consider the day to be "Pool Party #2 Planning," and we will try again next week! Thank you Coach Teri, and Sam, for welcoming us today and for the wonderful lunch. Thanks, also, for rescheduling the party for next Tuesday. We were disappointed about today, but things always work out in the end! We'll see you next week, Teri!
Since we had a bit of extra time, we stopped by the garden at Freedom Park and picked peppers. The garden looked so beautiful with lots of colorful flowers in bloom.
When our MG friends Karen and Linda stopped by the center last week, Linda mentioned that we needed to look for the sugar baby watermelons next time we went to the garden. While Kacie and Liz looked for more peppers, Devin and Annmarie spotted two sugar babies!
We can't wait to try them!
With all the pretty flowers, the butterflies were in abundance. Freedom Park and the Botanical Garden had hosted a butterfly festival over the weekend, so maybe some of the butterflies were still hanging around!
Kacie got this pretty close up of a butterfly feasting on some nectar.
We ended the day Tuesday with a stop by the Salvation Army where we donated several bags and boxes full of donated food! This is Linda, who was so happy to meet us and accept our donations!
This was our first time collecting for the Salvation Army's Food Pantry. We are all smiles because the folks there were appreciative of our efforts. Thank you to our AoA families, staff, and volunteers for your support! Such a simple thing, but it made a big difference!
Our bird feeders have been busy this summer. On Wednesday morning we were able to snap a picture of a pair of cardinals that we see together frequently. At the same time, one of three hummingbirds that frequent our feeder was perched on the tomato cage!
We finally caught up with Mr. Howard and gave him the birthday cards we made for him 3 weeks ago! 😍 He's so busy going from school to school now, we don't see him as much as we'd like!
August 4th is Friendship Day, but we celebrated it on Wednesday. It's one of our favorite activities each year. Everyone picks a friend's name and makes them a special card. Here, Liz is reading what she wrote to Abraham, which included that he is handsome, is a good dancer, and has a great smile!
Devin had Kacie's name. He wrote a heartfelt note that said we miss her when she is gone (she was away for two weeks!), she's great at Disney Trivia, and he enjoys sitting with her on the van!
Look at these smiles!
Who doesn't love to get a Friendship Day card?!
This is us doing "Beauty and the Beast" themed yoga with Patti. Arms up represents the Beast, and hands together (holding a rose) represents Belle.
Somehow, Patti turned the story into gentle stretches and core-strengthening exercises!
It felt great, and it was so quiet as everyone listened to her version of the story!
What a happy ending! Here's Patti with all of her Beasts and Belles!
August 4th was also Coast Guard Day! Carol likes this day because she's the proud mom of a Coastie. Her son Adam has been in for almost 10 years! She wore a Coast Guard shirt and brought some things to share with us. Here, she is telling us about his graduation from basic training in Cape May, NJ.
She also shared video clips and a photo slide show with us. We got to see Adam through the years. He is a gunner and has also been an instructor for the Coast Guard. He is currently serving in Mobile, Alabama where he lives with his wife, Kelley. Carol said he loves his mission with the Coast Guard. She then surprised us by announcing that he and Kelley are looking forward to a new "mission" in January: Becoming parents! Yes! Our Carol is going to be a grandma to a sweet baby boy!! Congratulations, Carol! We are so excited and happy for your family! 👶🍼
This week we worked on making a thank you for Patti and our WOTM friends to show our appreciation for their hard work in putting on the golf tournament last Saturday. We designed a "hole-in-one" that is really five holes-in-one because the WOTM is more than just one to us!
Each associate wrote a message that we printed on a pin flag. We added their pictures on the backs of the flags and inserted the flags into the balls. It's really cute and Patti is going to love it!
Sam and Kate helped us cut the sugar baby watermelons we picked at the Botanical Garden on Tuesday. They weren't totally ripe, but they were mostly ripe, and they tasted sweet, just as their name suggests!
For a group our size, we needed more than the little sugar baby watermelons, so we picked up another one at the market. Nan got a nifty gadget for her birthday, that guaranteed it would make cutting up a watermelon "amazingly easy and fast." She gave it a try, and it worked!
It sliced and cubed the melon at the same time! Thanks for sharing it with us, Nan!
We're still enjoying the gym while students have a few more weeks of summer break!
Power walking ladies!
The fifth state to enter the Union was Connecticut, which we learned about on Thursday. For our stately recipe, we chose hot dogs with "hot dog sauce" based on the recipe from Capitol Lunch in New Britain. It's one of many hog dog stands in Connecticut, and their hot dog sauce is a favorite of Connecticuters. It has a unique taste that comes from adding allspice and brown sugar to the recipe.
Here's our lunch version, along with our watermelon, carrots, and rice pudding, which we made to celebrate Rice Pudding Day (August 8). As usual, our lunch was tasty, and our take on Capitol Lunch's hot dog sauce was great!
Kevin was helpful when we finished all of our cooking. He made a couple of trips to the storage room to put away cooking supplies. Thanks, Kevin!
August 8 is also National Dollar Day! We looked at real dollar bills (thanks for having lots of them, Carol!) and watched a video that explained what the different symbols on them mean. Then we played a fun game...with play money!
Depending on what number you rolled on the dice, you might have to give your dollars away! The game went back and forth with our players losing and gaining dollars. We didn't have time to play until we had a winner, but in the real game, someone would end up winning all the dollars.
When it comes to famous people from Connecticut, our associates had heard of former president George W. Bush...and that was about it! However, a popular Disney song from the movie "Hercules" is sung by Michael Bolton, so now they know of two famous Connecticuters! Sam paused from singing "Go The Distance" long enough for us to snap a picture of him with his Connecticut bag!
We wasted no time heading to Eaton on Friday. We haven't had a work day in a few weeks and we were ready, which was a good thing. James was not here today, but he left us a LOT of things to get done! Thanks, James! We can handle it!
Kevin and Xavier led the way on PowerSlide Door assembly. We were missing 5 associates today, so everyone had to step up and do a little more. These two worked steadily to apply screws at four places on each door.
Sam unpacked and transferred doors from table to table, keeping the pace going as he often does. Nan and Alexis applied label after label on the doors - four on each - and made it look easy! Meanwhile, in the background, Kate is attaching the window piece to each door, and she also kept up with the pace.
When Sam was "reassigned" to window attachment so Kate could help on other tasks, Meemaw stepped in to help get doors out of the boxes. We're very proud of the Door Team today. They assembled 400 doors with a less than full team today!
Becky helped today and was able to bring Emmy. We needed them in the parts room. James left us a lot of things to unpack! Kacie trained Emmy on gently removing light bulbs and placing them in boxes surrounded by bubble wrap. Emmy did a great job...Kacie is a great teacher! 🙋
We had Drew all over the place today. He went into the outside room to bring in boxes when those who were unpacking ran out. He also helped break apart big plastic pieces. At one point he had to sort a box of mixed parts all by himself! Way to pick up the slack, Drew!
Liz and Kacie spent a good part of the morning attaching screws to these little white parts. It's not as easy as it seems; the screws have to be aligned just so or they won't go in very easily!
There was a bin full of plastic parts with little pieces attached and the little pieces needed to be popped off. Patrick, Devin, and Abraham worked diligently until lunch time (with help from Drew later) and got them all finished!
We had to send for Sam when we couldn't figure out how to open the side door of the bin so as to get to the parts more easily. Sam has done this many times before and was happy to show us the trick! Thanks, Sam!
We returned to AFCC when we wrapped up our Eaton work and headed to the gym to burn off any extra energy we had left! Then, next thing we knew, it was time to call it another week! We will be busy again next week. Here's what's on the schedule:
Tuesday: Coach Teri graciously rescheduled our Pool Party for today! When Nina (Sam's grandmother) heard about last week's party being canceled, she decided to treat us to lunch from Chick fil A for Pool Party Part 2! Thank you so much, Nina, and Teri. This is very, very generous of both of you. Wear your suits and bring towels and sunscreen! It's going to be awesome!
Wednesday: We're expecting a special visitor today that many of our associates used to hang out with, and the others will enjoy meeting! Tomorrow is Relaxation Day, but we will celebrate it today with Patti during yoga. Yesterday was Left-Handers Day, so we will have fun with that, too. We have several lefties in our program. Lunch on your own and dress for yoga!
Thursday: We're heading back to Eaton for another work day, so wear your Arc shirts and bring a bag lunch!
Friday: Today we will celebrate the 6th state to join the Union, Massachusetts. They love seafood up there, but it's a bit much for our budget, so we will enjoy Boston Baked Beans and grilled cheese sandwiches for lunch. Devin's Grandma Sarah, who donated new board games to us this year, will also visit to play games with us and bake chocolate chip cookies...which is perfect because Massachusetts is where Toll House Cookies came from!
Enjoy the weekend,
Lisa, Carol, and Nan
