Happy Birthday, Liz and Patrick!

 

It's been a great Fall Birthday Season, but we wrapped it up this week with our celebration for Liz and Patrick on Tuesday.  What a double the fun time that was!!  Now, we await the arrival of the winter season when we will celebrate a few more...  

In other news this week, we volunteered at Grove, had a fun visit with Mike at the Watermen's Museum, worked at Pet Supplies Plus, and cooked and cleaned!  It was a really nice week!

Tuesday

Since we would be celebrating Liz and Patrick at lunch time with a chicken nugget meal, we knew we needed to get in some steps and movement ahead of the party.  We spent the morning at Newport News Park doing just that!

Upon our return to the center, Liz and Patrick's families were arriving with our delicious lunch treat.  The aroma from the chicken nuggets had our mouths watering!  Chips, apple slices, and pink lemonade rounded out the menu, and lunch was perfect!  Afterwards, we indulged in delicious cupcakes, too!

Liz and Patrick, we hope all your wishes come true!  Happy 30th to Liz, and Happy 33rd to Pat!  Even though you were born in different years, you will always be birthday twins, since you were both born on November 11.  We had a great time celebrating you together...it really was double the fun!

We can't thank the families of Patrick and Liz enough for treating us to a wonderful lunch.  Sue and Kevin, and Lise and Greg, we really appreciate the time you spent with us, too.  It's always great to catch up with you!

The double the fun birthday party continued with double game time!  First, we played "AoA Fun" Jeopardy.  Jeopardy is one of Liz's favorite games, so Lisa created a version filled with questions about our program, and we knew the answers to almost all of them!

Next, we cleared the room for a birthday version of corn hole, which Patrick requested.  It was Team Birthday Boy versus Team Birthday Girl.  The girls started off slowly, and after Round 1 they were down by a score of 10-3.

The girls rallied quite a bit in Round 2, but in the end, Team Birthday Boy won 16-12!  Congratulations, guys, on a fun win for Patrick on his special day!!

Wednesday, November 13

This morning we sent a great group of Library Leaders to work in the JRES Library.  We had to take two photos to capture them all!  Thanks for your dedication to this volunteer opportunity, Liz, Bryan, Emma, Beka, Alexis, and Laura!

  

Other activities this morning included working in our "Card Factory" where we began working on a backlog of thank you notes we owe folks!  For all of our amazing families and friends who have been so good to us this fall, we have not forgotten you!  We appreciate you very much and you'll get a note of thanks very soon!

As quickly as we could color, cut, and write, Allison was gluing doo-dads on the cards and helping us finalize our products!  Thanks, Allison!

Meanwhile, down at Grove Christian Outreach, look at how productively our guys worked on the food distribution assembly line.  First, they got organized under the direction of volunteer Ursula.

Soon they were joined by volunteers Thom, Peggy, Joel, and Tom.  What a team!

Ursula treated us to Christmas decorated meringue cookies she made.  They were delicious, and so light!  

No pictures to share, but we spent the rest of the day learning about Veterans Day; enjoying lunch followed by a very chatty, silly, and loud Choice Time; and listening to a couple of chapters from our read-aloud, Stargirl.  

We also supported Liz as she practiced the speech for her brother's wedding one last time.  She will be out tomorrow and Friday to be with family before the wedding on Saturday.  She asked for a "group hug"  with her friends.  It was hard to get everyone in the picture, but we are all pulling for her and can't wait to hear about the wedding!

Thursday, November 14

When we arrived at the Watermen's to visit with Mike today, we were happy to see Carrie and Erin, friends from the National Park Service that we met back in June when we celebrated Free Fishing Day with Mike.  They joined our lesson today and helped us with our project!

Our lesson today was about turkeys, and we learned that turkeys got their name from the country of Turkey!  When the settlers saw them here in the "new world" they recognized them as the same bird they knew to be imported from Turkey, so that's what they called them!  

Tomorrow is America Recycles Day, so our project with Mike was a great fit!  We used a box, a paper towel roll, and some paper bags to construct a turkey!  On the feathers, which were cut from construction paper, we wrote or drew things we were thankful for, which is always a good thing to spend time thinking about!

Why weren't we surprised when Mike hung the turkey from the ceiling?!  Actually, we're glad he did because it gave us tips on how to hang it from our ceiling when we get back to the center!

Thanks, Mike!  Our time with you is always great, and we truly look forward to the projects we make with you!  It was great to see Erin and Carrie again, too.  Happy Thanksgiving to you all! 🦃🦃🦃

We decided it was a little too windy and chilly to stay at Yorktown to eat outside, but we did take a "turkey trot" before returning to AFCC!  We plan to take a few more "turkey trots" before the holiday, too!

Lunch Lady Liz is away for her brother's wedding, but she would be proud of Bryan and Alexis for taking her place.  They did a great job and got everyone's orders correct! 

Tom Turkey is hanging from our ceiling!  We think he kind of looks like the one in Macy's parade!  LOL!

After lunch we had a work session.  Erik and Alexis put gaskets on Eaton parts.  Annmarie, Sam, Michelle, and Laura worked on more thank you cards for us to send to our many family members and friends who have been so generous to us recently.

Emma, Beka, and Kate prepared books from the JRES Library for discarding.  Patrick, Devin, Thomas, and Bryan organized and inventoried the donations we've collected so far for the Fall Food Drive.  Abraham, Kevin, Xavier, and Drew had hundreds of Eaton parts to sort.  It was a busy afternoon for us!

Friday, November 15

It was a rainy and chilly start to the day, but we didn't let it keep us from heading to Pet Supplies Plus for a work morning.  They count on our help. 👍 Today, it was stocking, stocking, and more stocking!

Alexis, Erik, and Thomas making sure the dog aisle was stocked!

Bryan, Thomas, Erik, and Laura stocking more dog goodies!

Seems like Laura worked with everyone as she also stocked with Bryan and Abraham!

We were happy to see Brittany and Lola, the ferret, today!  Brittany wasn't feeling well the last time we worked at PSP.

We enjoyed working with Margie, and also showing off Thanksgiving bandanas.  Our PSP friends said we could keep them for ourselves, or gift them to a favorite pup! 

Meanwhile, the group that stayed at the center was also working hard!  They prepared lunch, cleaned the fridge, microwave, and Nina, and started working on a family gift for the holidays!

Michelle and Beka started their day in the kitchen where they made fruit salad for lunch.  Next, they joined Nan to work on a decorative holiday gift for our families.

Four of our members were absent today - all girls!  Since Beka and Michelle were working on the gifts, the fellas were left to do the rest of the cooking, and the cleaning!

Once the chicken was baked, Devin and Patrick tore it into small pieces so we could add spices and salsa to make it tasty for our nachos!

Kevin and Drew are a good team who carefully measured ingredients for our rice side dish.  Here, they were adding water to the rice cookers.

Kevin headed to the restroom, but Drew gave the rice a good stir to mix in all the spices!

Next, the guys celebrated National Clean Out the Fridge Day!  

With a little extra time before the PSP group returned, we cranked up the dance music.  We were thrilled when Xavier sang!

Lunch was great!  We need to make chicken nachos and yellow rice more often!  (The fruit salad was...what else...yummy, yummy!  We didn't get a photo, though.)

After Choice Time and read-aloud it was time to put away tables, chairs, and supplies so we could stretch out for yoga with Jaime!

This is a relaxing way to end a busy week, and everyone practices at their own pace.  We think our newest member, Thomas, even fell asleep during Peace Out at the end!  Jaime would probably take that as a compliment, Thomas!

Everyone was calm and relaxed after yoga, and the sun was even peeking through the clouds!  The weekend is forecast to be beautiful. Here are our plans for next week:

Tuesday:  This morning we will celebrate National Monopoly Day with board games!  Feel free to bring a game to share.  After an early lunch we will head to The Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg for a visit with Christina.  Please wear Arc shirts.  We are also sending home the "Secret Santa Helper Forms," so be on the lookout so you can fill them in with helpful hints for your Secret Santa!  Lunch on your own.  JRES Cafeteria is serving Taco, Taco Salad, or Pizza (school made).  Microwave available.

Wednesday:  It's Therapy Dog Day!  We will celebrate the season of Thanksgiving with reading, brain work, and a treat to celebrate Peanut Butter Fudge Day!  We'll also have lessons from Mystery Science to find out if other countries celebrate Thanksgiving, and why we eat turkey on that holiday!  Lunch on your own.  JRES Cafeteria is offering Cheesy Pasta Supreme or Sub of the Day.  Microwave available.

Thursday:  Today we are going to celebrate National Stuffing Day, as well as tomorrow's National Cranberry Relish Day, by putting our twist on a Thanksgiving meal.  We'll divide into teams to prepare turkey chili, cornbread stuffing (dressing, actually), and cranberry relish/salad for lunch.  Other activities today will include a lesson about Thanksgiving in the colonies, and we'll watch the movie The Mouse on the Mayflower.

Friday:  It's off to Eaton for a work day, so please wear Eaton shirts and bring a bagged lunch.  The weather forecast looks pretty good for time outside, so we'll plan to take a walk at the park, too.  

The AoA will be in session on Monday and Tuesday, November 25-26.  We will be closed November 27-29 for the Thanksgiving holiday.

Have a great weekend,

Lisa, Carol, Nan, and the AoA Gang

Happy Birthday, Thomas and Rebekah!

This week we continued our celebration of fall birthdays as Thomas and Rebekah kicked off the November ones!   We feel very lucky to have so many good friends, and we never tire of celebrating birthdays!  We did our fair share of working this week, too, as we voluteered at Grove on Wednesday and worked at Eaton on Friday.  Thursday was fun because we went to a tea party before celebrating Beka's birthday at lunch time!  All of that, along with continued nice weather, made for a delightful week!

Tuesday, November 5

We had nearly perfect attendance today, as all but Tessa were here.  We also welcomed Cameron for a visit, so we took 19 on our bowling adventure today!  Luckily, all of the lanes worked really well, and our two hours of bowling time flew by.  With plenty of strikes and spares, there were great scores all around, and of course, lots of cheering and high-fives!

Beka, Lexi, Drew, Patrick, and Kate 

Kevin, Annmarie, the Birthday Boy Thomas, and Abraham

Laura, Liz, Cameron, Emma, and Xavier

Sam, Devin, Bryan, and Erik

Michelle, who missed one of the group shots!

Bowling was lots of fun, but by 11:45 we were ready to head back to the center for lunch.  Today we are thankful to Cameron's family for sponsoring our hot and tasty pizzas from Domino's.  Sooo good after a busy bowling morning!  Thanks, Brian and Stacey!!

We are also thankful to Thomas's family for providing sweet and creamy pumpkin pie, with whipped cream no less, for his birthday!!  The pie was the perfect finish after our pizzas.  Thomas, we hope all your wishes come true!!  We're so happy you joined our group this year!

Our day ended with a lesson about Election Day.  One thing we learned is that it is always on the first Tuesday in November, except when the first Tuesday is November 1st, then Election Day is moved to November 8th.  That seemed like a good idea to us, because having an election on the day after Halloween could be a little weird!

We played Election Day Bingo because it's Election Day...but also because Thomas loves Bingo!  Happy 24th Birthday, Thomas!  It's pretty cool that you join Tessa in being the only members of our group to be born in the 21st century!!

Wednesday, November 6

Time to volunteer at the JRES Library!  We sent a big team that worked so well together. 

Time to volunteer at GCOC, too!  Lisa took a group who helped set up and pack many boxes of canned and packaged foods.  Peggy and Joel were traveling today, but we worked efficiently with Ursula, Thom, Tom, and some new volunteers from Faith Recovery who joined us and did a lot of heavy lifting!  

Look at Patrick picking up two cans with one hand!

Thank you, Ursula, for letting us sample your "trial Christmas cookies" with the beautiful red, green, and white swirls of royal icing.  They were almost too beautiful to eat!  We should have taken a close-up photo so everyone could see your baked works of art.  We appreciate you for sharing with us!

Back at the center, our other group made beautiful posters for our Food Drive.  It's underway between now and about November 25th (our Monday session!), so please consider making a donation so we can fill a few boxes for GCOC.  The need is great, and our friends do amazing work in the Grove community.  Thank you for supporting us as we support them!

Our friend Liz is preparing to be in her brother Stephen's wedding on November 16.  Today she showed us the venue where the wedding will take place, and then practiced the speech she is going to give at the reception.  

When she got a little emotional near the end, talking about what a great brother Stephen is to her, Devin went up to comfort her with a hand on her shoulder.  Everyone was supportive, and a wonderful audience.  We'll let her keep practicing on us, and we know she'll shine on the big day!  💖

We ended the day learning about the "famous" tea party...the one in Boston, and then talked about the smaller one about a year later that was held in Yorktown.  Those and other tea parties helped to build a spirit of resistance to Great Britain which eventually led to our Declaration of Independence and the Revolutionary War.  Our friend Mike from the Watermen's Museum is working on a number of events leading up to the 250th anniversary of American independence, and we're excited to learn more about our country's history as he shares the adventure with us.  Tomorrow, we'll check out Yorktown's reenactment of their tea party that took place in 1774!

Thursday, November 7

What a fun time we had at Yorktown for the reenactment of the November 7, 1774 tea party!

We got great seats and when we spotted Mike, we waved!

Mike is on the Virginia 250 Commision, and is working to organize many of the Virginia events leading up to our country's 250th anniversary celebration of American independence.  He was made for these kinds of events, and doesn't he look handsome in his period costume?!

There was a good sized crowd, and Mike was very good at being the emcee for the ceremony!  We stood when it was time for the national anthem and Pledge of Allegiance.  Several local dignataries made brief remarks before the person representing Thomas Nelson, spoke.  He led the colonists at Yorktown who dumped the tea into the river.

When it was time for the dumping of the tea into the river, we turned toward the boat and joined in with others to chant, "Dump the tea!  Dump the tea!"

Thanks, Mike, for encouraging us to attend today's ceremony.  We understand that our state played major roles in securing America's independence, and we are proud Virginians!

Yorktown was just 1/2 of our fun day.  When we returned to AFCC, it was time for Beka's birthday!!  Her official birthday is Saturday, but today was our day to celebrate her!  She chose a menu of popcorn chicken, shells and cheese, fresh veggies with Ranch, sweet tea, and cupcakes, and we couldn't have agreed more with her that they were delicious selections!

We would like to thank Beka's mom, Susan, for today's lunch, and also for spending the afternoon with us.  Susan, we appreciate you for taking the time to pick up the tasty chicken from Publix in Williamsburg, even though you live in Newport News!  We had so much fun celebrating your daughter today!

Beka, we hope all your wishes come true!  We are happy you joined the Arc of Abilities this year, and we look forward to many more fun birthdays with you!

Beka is a fan of group games, so after lunch we had game time!  There were lots of laughs, and plenty of good conversation as everyone joined in on some friendly competition.  It was a great ending to a very nice day!

The Birthday Girl and her mom, Susan, played several rounds of Uno with Devin, Alexis, Sam, Thomas, and Liz.

Michelle and Annmarie challenged each other with Connect 4.

Nan, Patrick, and Laura made words as they played Scrabble, Jr.

Something Kate, Emma, or Erik said got a giggle out of Carol during a game of Headbanz!

Kevin, Drew, Abraham, Bryan, and Xavier chose a more active game of corn hole.

Friday, November 8

We began our Friday with a celebration of National Cappuccino Day!  Our drinks were delicious, even though Lisa was our barista and the recipe involved a dry mix!  She used oat milk, which made for a creamier and nuttier taste.  We had no complaints!

Later, our days of "partying" ended as we headed to Eaton for a work day!  We assembled 144 PowerSlide doors, and sorted and consolidated hundreds of pieces in the large bins.  We enjoy working at Eaton, so it really is like a work "party" for us!

We are ready to roll as we line up in the hallway for Lisa's van on the left and Carol's van on the right.  It makes counting heads much easier!

Patrick and Drew transferred plates from the large bin to smaller tubs.  

Laura and Annmarie are so clever to turn the tub up on its side so they can more easily reach the pieces to sort!

Step 1 on door assembly:  Michelle and Bryan make sure the amber lenses are inserted tightly.

Step 2:  Labels are applied by our ladies - Liz, Alexis, and Nan.

Step 3:  Inserting four sets of nuts and bolts, and tightening them just enough that they don't fall off before step 4.  Xavier, Devin, Emma, and Beka handled it well today!

Erik did double duty on Step 4 which is tightening the screws with the electric screwdriver, and Step 5 which is packing the doors back into the plastic wrapping and the boxes!

We finished at Eaton in time to enjoy another beautiful day outside, so we ate lunch at New Quarter Park.  We followed that with walking and time on the playground before returning to the center because someone mentioned it was time for the weekend!

We are happy to share that Tessa is working hard on her physical and occupational therapies at her home.  Her mom Michelle reports that she's increasing her strength every day, but she is still challenged by trying to stand, as she's afraid of falling.  Keep your chin up, Tessa, and work hard with mom and your therapists.  You'll get there.  We are all pulling for you!

Our first full week of November is a wrap!  Here are our plans for the upcoming week:

Tuesday:  This morning we had hoped to meet our master gardener friends at the garden to harvest our sweet potatoes.  But alas, a Friday check by Karen revealed that something had eaten the roots and our sweet potatoes did not have a chance to grow.  We're very disappointed, but we will try again next year.  Since we also planned to take a walk while at the garden, we'll take a short trip to NN Park and get some exercise before returning to the center to celebrate two more fall birthdays for Liz and Patrick!  Their families are providing a chicken nugget luncheon for us.  We'll continue the party with a Jeopardy game (Liz's choice) followed by corn hole (Pat's choice).  It's going to be double the fun! 

Wednesday:  We will send a group to volunteer at Grove this morning, while the others work on creating a number of thank you cards we need to send!  Please wear Arc shirts.  We'll work on November room decorations and have a slightly delayed lesson about Veterans Day, too.  Lunch on your own.  JRES Cafeteria is offering Roasted Chicken w/ mashed potatoes and corn, or Hot Dog. 😋

Thursday:  We're headed back to Yorktown today for our regular monthly lesson with Mike at the Watermen's Museum.  We'll keep our eye on the weather (might there finally be rain?!) and hopefully spend lunch and movement time outside after Mike's lesson.  Please bring a bagged lunch.

Friday:  We will work at Pet Supplies Plus this morning so please wear PSP shirts.  The crew that stays at the center will prepare chicken nachos and fruit salad for lunch.  We will also work on a holiday craft/gift for our families, and we'll end the day with yoga, so dress to stretch!

Families - Don't forget that we will be in session on Monday, November 25th and Tuesday, November 26th for the week of Thanksgiving.  We will be closed Wednesday, November 27th-Friday, November 29th.  This is the only Monday of the year that we meet, so we will have a two day week before the Thanksgiving holiday.

Lisa, Carol, Nan, and the AoA Gang