Thank You, Women of the Moose!

Somehow, it's October already, and we are gearing up for a busy month!  We have a couple of extra outings in the works, some new projects to begin, and we will be making plans for our annual Halloween celebration.  All that, plus our usual jam-packed days will keep us on our toes for the month!  Meanwhile, here's what we were up to this first week of October...including some AWESOME news regarding our Women of the Moose friends AND a slew of pictures from our wonderfully successful 5K! 😍😍😍

Everyone's favorite outing was on Tuesday:  bowling!  We had a lot of fun and, as is our pattern, our guys did very well.  We love seeing how they improve time after time.

Today we took most of our pictures from behind the lanes.  Here, Kacie and Bo look for their marks, Kacie with her eyes and Bo with his feet.

Dev and Alexis have different styles - she goes a little lower before release.  Both styles work!

Ever the gentleman, Patrick waits for Annmarie to release her ball before proceeding with his own turn.

Patrick, Bo, and Sam each doing their thing!

Can you tell from this photo that Cameron has a strong, solid roll?  With a 138, he had Tuesday's highest score! 👏👏

Our volunteer Pam was happy to step in when one of our guys was in the bathroom.  Sometimes we have to keep the game going!

Thank you to Laura's family, the Palmers, for sponsoring our pizza lunch.  So tasty!  We are grateful for our families' extra support in the way of "pizza funds."  Our budget goes a little farther thanks to your generosity!

It was warm but not too muggy on Tuesday so we went to Freedom Park after bowling to stretch our legs and walk off some of the pizza calories!

We walked a little over a half mile in this direction on the paved trail.

When we reached the bridge, we turned around for another half mile (the uphill part) back!  Good job, guys!

Drew and Laura teamed up because it's more fun to walk with a buddy! 

We began our flower arranging project on Wednesday!  Pam McGregor showed up with lots of donated flowers from Trader Joe's.  She taught us how to remove leaves that weren't fresh and how to cut the stem at an angle so it could access fresh water.

Patrick was choosing flowers to use in an arrangement for Mr. Howard, since it was Custodial Workers Day.  Pam helped him choose "masculine" colors.

Kacie put together this lovely arrangement.  We gave it to Christina at the Art Museums on Thursday.

These are the beautiful arrangements we made.  We shared some of

 them with our friends at JRES in the cafeteria and office.  They were all smiles to receive these touches of color!  Thank you, Pam!  This is going to be a fun project for us and your tips and encouragement are wonderful!

In addition to the flower arrangements, we made thank you notes for Heike and Mr. Howard to show our appreciation on National Custodial Workers Day.  We also baked cookies for them!

Here's Heike when we gave her the flowers and cookies.  She was very touched by our gesture!

Mr. Howard was also happy to receive some love from us!  We enjoy working with our custodians and are appreciative of all they do for us.

We had one arrangement left, so Alexis was delighted to present it to Becky, who was quite surprised!  

Patti was under the weather on Wednesday, so we had yoga with our favorite online instructor, Jamie.  

We are up and down a lot with Jamie, but we don't seem to mind as she tells us an interesting story while we work out.

Today's story was about a young lioness trying to find her "roar."  We helped her!

Wednesday night was one of two huge HIGHLIGHTS of our week!! (Keep reading to discover the other!)  Our Women of the Williamsburg Moose Lodge friends presented us with the proceeds from the golf tournament they held to benefit The Arc and the Arc of Abilities back in August.  Thank you, WOTM, for this very generous donation of $6,000!  We are blessed by your friendship and support!  Several of our associates and their families were able to be on hand for this presentation, and we thank them, too:  Devin, Alexis, Liz, Patrick, Kate, and Sam!

Pam presented Patti with a lovely bouquet of fresh flowers.  Patti is our go-to from the Moose Lodge.  She has been one of the AoA's staunchest supporters since our beginning, back in March of 2016.  We love you, Patti and friends!

You may recognize a familiar face in these pictures...it's Josie!  She left our program for other opportunities earlier this year, but was able to come with her dad to surprise us at the Moose Lodge.  The tournament was held at the beautiful Kingsmill River Course this year, and it would not have been possible without the support of Josie's dad, John Hilker.  He's the Chief Operations Officer - Operations Turnaround & Growth / Profit & Service Level Improvement, at Kingsmill.  He kindly worked with Patti to arrange our tournament and we are grateful!  It was wonderful to see Josie's smiling face.  We miss her!

Mr. Howard is part of the "family," so we were tickled first thing on Thursday morning when he introduced us to his only granddaughter, Mia. She is four years old (and tall, like Grandpa) and attends the preschool program at JRES.  What a cutie with a big, bright smile! 

We had several things going on at once on Thursday morning, so we could get a lot done before having early lunch.  Some of our friends hit the dance floor.

These girls got started on rock painting.  Our theme was Halloween.

Kevin and Bo preferred to work on Eaton tasks.

Later, Annmarie had painted a rock and then chose to color while Sam, Devin, Nan, and Kacie worked on rocks.  In the background, Laura, Cameron, Dev, Chris, and Liz did some Eaton work while Chloe sat nearby and chatted with them.  Something for everyone on Thursday morning!

We had early lunch so we could head to the Art Museums of CW to visit with Christina.  We surprised her with one of our flower arrangements and an Arc t-shirt.  She was excited!!  We are grateful for our monthly visits, and we enjoy all the fun and educational things we do with her.

On this visit we got to work first thing.  We used patterns to trace fall leaves and watercolors to paint them.

This is how they turned out after we displayed them on the wall in our room.  Gorgeous!

While our watercolor paintings were drying, Christina took us on a "Find Your Fears" adventure through the museums.  We had to look for information on various displays that corresponded to clues in our booklets.  We were learning about different kinds of fears.

 

At the whirligig display, we learned that ancraophobes are people who fear the wind.

Christina helped Laura read a clue so we could figure out that ranidaphobes fear frogs!

Can you believe that some people fear the number 2?  At this Noah's Ark toy exhibit we learned that such people are dyophobic!

Kacie helped us figure out that chirophobics have a fear of hands! When we finished the scavenger-hunt type adventure, we earned a pin that looks like the museum depicted as a haunted house.  We didn't get a picture, but hopefully everyone took their booklets and pins home.  We highly recommend you visit the Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg.  This self-guided tour is just one example of the fun you can have there!

Alexis and Liz are early birds, arriving at the center a few minutes before our other friends.  So on Friday morning, they were put to work preparing cupcakes for Lisa's birthday celebration.  This is the first time we have put someone on a cooking task with very little assistance from a staff member or volunteer.  After asking a few questions, and being given lots of encouragement, they found their confidence and did a fantastic job!

Once the cupcakes cooled, they enlisted Kacie's help to frost them, and voila!  We're very proud of them.  And the cupcakes were delicious!

Since we were having crunchy tacos for lunch (National Taco Day was Thursday), we made our own taco holders using cardboard from cereal boxes.  Aren't they decorated in fun fiesta colors?!

The taco holders worked, but we forgot to get a picture of us using them when we added our toppings.  So here's a picture of Carol's tacos after she moved them to her plate.  It was a great lunch today, one of Lisa's favorites!

The gang gathered with Lisa in front of the birthday board for a group picture.  We were missing four friends today, but we partied on!  Birthdays are so much fun at the AoA!

After we (sort of) settled down from the party fun, we celebrated our smarts by working in our groups.  Today we had to follow tricky directions to complete a worksheet about ghosts.

Here, Becky helps her group narrow their focus in order to complete part of the assignment.

Carol and Nan worked with this group on listening comprehension.  They had to focus on clues in the story so they could answer the tricky questions!  They liked the story a lot...the questions, not so much!  #brainwork

We're having fun decorating our room for Fall/Halloween.  We have our beautiful leaf watercolors on the wall, along with the other leaves and apples we made last week.  They are all very pretty and make our room look like an art gallery!  So today, we made something silly...ghosts!  Xavier and Alexis showed theirs to each other.

We ended the day posing with our "spirited" ghost creations!

Next week, we may try spiders...or skeletons...or pumpkins.  So many fun options this time of year!  

Finally, our SECOND BIG HIGHLIGHT of the week was Saturday's 5K!  Wow...it was a huge success! In fact, it was The Arc's greatest one yet!  Thank you, AoA families and friends, for your support!  It was great seeing so many of you there.  Enjoy these photos...

We were delighted to see Christina from the Art Museums of CW and we got to meet her husband, Michael.  He took our selfie!

Alexis and Liz were all smiles along with Drew's Dad (and Arc board president) Andy, and Liz's dad, Greg.

Cameron was here with his parents, sister, and brother-in-law!

Nan volunteered at the refreshment table with Bette Faye's niece Roxy and her darling daughter, Amaya! Bette Faye, where were you?!  We didn't get a picture of you today...😕  You were very busy keeping things running smoothly!

Becky joined us for her first Arc 5K, and Kacie had her best race time ever!  Yay, Kacie!

Look at our friend and former AoA associate Meghan coming up on the finish line!  So glad we get to see her at Arc events!

Sam and his dad ran together!  Tim ran the 1 mile Fun Run with Sam and then completed the 5K with a time that earned him 1st place in his age division...and 4th overall! Wow, Tim!

Here comes Laura's family (minus Laura, who we caught later):  Mom, Dad, sister, brother-in-law, and niece, Baby O!

We're surprised this picture of Chris isn't blurry since he was running so fast!

Hi Drew!  Great job on the race, buddy!

Alexis and her Gdad chatted before the race, as did Liz and Carol.  Aren't they looking good in those bright yellow race shirts?!

Kacie and Alexis caught up with board member Devin, who was driving the Arc bus shuttle!

Moose friend Patti was here to support everyone, too!  She talked with Carol and Carol's husband Gene right before the race began. 

Later we caught Patti and her dog, Cam, walking with Alexis and Liz.  Patti and Cam did the 1 mile and the 5K!  

Here's Laura!  She was happy to see Becky and lots of other friends, too!

We had over 40 sponsors for the 5K this year!  The Williamsburg Landing is our amazing host sponsor.  This was their 9th year hosting the 5K.  We are grateful for their support!

Alexis took a tumble and scraped up her knee, but kept on moving after a little first aid was administered.  Very proud of her!  Over her shoulder is our guy Cameron coming to the finish line, too!

They made it!

Here's Chris proudly showing his medal to Carol, Becky, and Lisa.  That dude can run!

Coach Teri accepted the 1st place medal from Pam for her husband, and Sam's dad, Tim...because he had to rush off to run another race! 

Our AoA parents represented!  Here's Kacie's mom, Stacey, going up to accept her medal for placing 3rd in her age bracket!

Board president Andy Dayton thanked everyone for supporting The Arc of Greater Williamsburg!  News flash:  Next year's 10th Annual Williamsburg Landing 5K for The Arc will be on October 5th!  Hope to see you there! 😎 

So, the 5K was the culmination to another busy week for us.  And here's what you need to know for next week:

Tuesday:  We visit with our Master Gardener friends at Freedom Park today!  They will help us fill our big pots with bulbs that we hope will bloom beautifully in the Spring.  Please wear Arc shirts AND bring a bag lunch.  We hope to picnic at the park and also explore a trail...even though the weather app suggests it might rain.  Our backup plan is to return to AFCC and talk about Columbus Day (yesterday).

Wednesday:   It's Flower Arranging Day!  (If Trader Joe's has any flowers to donate this week.)  We also have some Eaton work to finish and a new task from them to try.  Native American Day was Monday, so we will discuss that as a balance to our discussion of Columbus.  It will be a busy morning.  It's also Yoga w/ Patti today, so dress to move!  Lunch on your own!

Thursday:  It's Sausage Pizza Day so we will make our own pizza for lunch.  We'll put a healthier spin on it by using pita bread crusts, turkey sausage and lowfat cheese, but we promise it will be tasty!  In our continuing education lesson, we will take a look at Parkinson's disease, as a prep for tomorrow's outing.  We will also put finishing touches on the rocks we began painting last week and make more craft decorations for our room.

Friday:  We're going on a road trip today!  We will travel up I-64 to New Kent to visit Rock Steady Boxing/APEX Physical Therapy for a fitness class with Lexi's cousins Kelly and Scott, who recently opened this clinic.  Rock Steady Boxing is a fitness program developed to help those living with Parkinson's disease strengthen and maintain muscle movement, core strength, and balance, but anyone can benefit from its practice.  We will also have lunch nearby at the Colonial Kitchen and Market Place, followed by a walkabout in historic New Kent Courthouse before heading back to the center.  Please wear Arc shirts and comfortable pants or shorts.  ALSO, please bring $10 for lunch.  (We will choose from a menu that includes choices like chicken tenders, bbq sandwiches, burgers, and salads.)

Quick reminders:

The Octoberfest FUNdraiser is coming up on October 20.  This promises to be a ton of fun!  If you've ever wanted to see the "insides" of the Anheuser-Busch brewery, here's your chance!

Thursday, NOVEMBER 1 - AoA Family meeting!  We are still working on the details (it will be in the evening), so please stay tuned, and save the date!  THANKS!

Enjoy the weekend,

Lisa, Carol, and Nan