A Great Party with DCYF

On Saturday, December 14th, Altrusa of Carroll County in collaboration with DCYF hosted a fun Christmas party for all the foster families and their children living in Carroll County.  We had lots of goodies, snacks, desserts, hot chocolate and coffee for the 30+ children and their parents - about 60 attendees in all.  Activities were available, including cookie decorating and Lego building, books were given to all children, and an author and illustrator came to share their new Christmas story.  But best of all was the arrival of Santa Claus, with a twinkle in his eye and his merry "Ho, Ho, Ho!"

Altrusa Christmas Party

Many thanks to Lorraine who so kindly opened her home and hosted our Altrusa Christmas Party.  It was fun enjoying delicious food and good conversation with dear friends.  We have also replaced our Yankee Swap with gifts to charities near and dear to our hearts and this year we collected donations to Connect-A-Pet New England in Albany and to the Way Station in North Conway.  Connect-A-Pet is a dog rescue which works to match dogs with families in the area, and the Way Station is a day resource center for the homeless.  We also put together cookie trays for the residents and staff of the 3 nursing homes in Carroll County and which were delivered the next day.  Sharing and giving is the joy of the season!

Sorting and packing cookies

Delivering 4 trays of cookies to Mineral Springs.

Helping the Conway Village Congregational Church

On Thursday, November 21st, a group from Carroll County Altrusa helped the members of the Conway Village Congregational Church by busing tables and selling items as part of the Holiday Fair run by the church.  Some of us wore 2 hats - as church members and Altrusans - and enjoyed a delicious dinner!

Halloween Town

Our Club supports the work of the Laura Foundation for Autism and Epilepsy by assisting with their fundraiser and community effort, Halloween Town.  Held on October 26th at King Pine Ski Area and Camp Tohkomeupog in East Madison, NH, the site provides 1/2 mile of lighted pathways, decorated and spooky cabins for trick-or-treating, games, a bouncy house, games and lots of candy.  Our members greeted visitors, handed out maps, sold coffee and hot cocoa, and helped with the games.  It was fun seeing the children and all the costumes!

Making Strides Against Breast Cancer

Each year our Club organizes a team of walkers for the Making Strides event in North Conway held on October 20, 2019.  This year we raised about $2,000 for the Cancer Society to fund research about breast cancer!  In addition to joining the walk, our members worked on set-up and registration, helping where needed.  What a great group!!

Our team of walkers

Nancy and Cindy at the registration tent.

Ending 68-Hours of Hunger

Altrusa of Carroll County supports the effort to End 68-Hours of Hunger by packing bags of food for local school children on the 4th Thursday of each month through the end of school.  On October 24th we had a great group of nine, Altrusans and friends, work to pack these bags.  With so many helpers, we were able to complete the job early and have time to chat.  What a wonderful group of hard-working women!

Kathy Laracy was chief "bag-lady", getting the double bags lined up.

Our crew after filling approximately 140 bags for all the local schools.  Still smiling!

Helping with the Reach the Beach Race

Lisa Dufault and Valley Promotions helps Altrusa of Carroll County to publicize and promote our projects and in turn we assist her at a stop on the Reach the Beach Relay Race.  The Race was held this year on Friday, September 13th and Lisa was in charge of the Echo Lake State Park transition point.  Four of our members helped with directing traffic, recording times and answering questions from the runners and their teams.  It was a beautiful sunny day and a very successful race with 500 teams participating in the 200 mile relay.

Donna was time-keeper while Cathy, Diane and Kathy directed traffic.

Committees Meeting and Planning

As we begin a new season with Altrusa, the members of our various committees are meeting, usually over some delicious meals, and making plans for an exciting year!

Communications Committee meeting

Community Service Committee planning service projects

A New Season!

As many of us finish up a fun summer of travel, friends and family, we are all looking forward to a new season with Altrusa.  The Board has planned an exciting new year with interesting speakers and events. Our first meeting this Fall will be on Tuesday, September 3, 2019 at 6:00 pm at Runnells Hall in Chocorua.  This will be our first meeting at our new day - the first Tuesday of the month.  The Hospitality Committee will be hosting this first meeting and the members urge all to remember to bring your own plates and placemat.  In a effort to be more environmentally conscious and not throw out plastic tablecloths each month, these members suggest that we each bring a placemat along with our plates.

Be sure to check out the Calendar of Events on this blog to see what is happening!

June Dinner Meeting at The Preserve

What a wonderful evening we enjoyed at The Preserve at Chocorua in Tamworth!  We first inducted our newest member, Cheryl Lang of Ossipee, in a ceremony with a warm welcome from Nancy and Janel.  This was followed by a brief meeting during which Diane announced that the Cook Library Plant Sale earned approximately $2,000 for our club.  A very successful fundraiser!!  After a short discussion, the membership voted to change the date of our Club meetings to the 1st Tuesday of each month, starting in September.  With this change we hope to avoid the conflicts with the Monday holidays.  For our summer activities it was decided to have a group trip to the Barnstormers in August, arranged by Ruth Stevens. More details will follow.  All the members are invited to visit the gang at Wells Beach and are urged to contact Nancy, Marsha, Lorraine or Barb to arrange a date.

We all enjoyed a delicious dinner after which we had a presentation by Candy Chaplin describing the work of the Nepal Children's Health and Education Foundation (NCHEF).  For more than 20 years, Cindy has arranged to support the residents of a remote village in Nepal with medical and educational supplies.  Her photos and the description of their work was heart-warming and our club voted to donate $100 to support the efforts of this foundation.

Altrusa members at The Preserve

Cheryl, Welcome to Altrusa! 

Candy Chaplin of the NCHEF receiving our donation for the children in Nepal after her presentation.

Fundraiser at the Gibson Center Craft Fair

The sun was shining on us as we held a fundraiser in cooperation with the Gibson Senior Center in North Conway.  In the middle of a very busy Memorial Day craft fair we set up a grill (thank you to Cathy Baybutt!) and sold hotdogs, chips, cookies and water.  Saturday was the busiest day but we handled it with our group of members who worked throughout the 2 days.  We sold out of hotdogs by 2 pm on Sunday with sales for the 2 days totaling $548.00 providing us with a profit of about $450 for our literacy projects.  Not bad for our first attempt!

Cookbooks to share

Altrusa of Carroll County received a donation of 100 cookbooks from Hannaford stores.  Our members chose to give these cookbooks to all of the local Food Pantries to be given out with bags of food.  Our Altrusa label was placed on each cookbook to help spread the word of our efforts.

Digging Plants

On Monday, May 20th, a group from Altrusa of Carroll County and from the Friends of the Cook Library gathered at the invitation from The Community School in South Tamworth to thin their gardens and to gather plants for the fundraising Plant Sale on June 1st.  Many pots were filled and readied for sale!  It was fun playing in the dirt!

Save the Dates! Upcoming Events

We have several up-coming events!  Mark your calendars and join us for fun and fund-raising!

• Hot Dogs, Hot Dogs!  May 25 - 26, 2019  - We will be selling hot dog lunches at the Gibson Center Craft Fair in North Conway center over Memorial Day weekend.
• Plant Sale! June 1, 2019 - at the Cook Memorial Library in Tamworth.  A collaborative fund-raising event with the Friends of the Cook Library to support our literacy programs.
• Dinner Meeting June 10, 2019, 5:30 pm.  At The Barn at the Preserve, Chocorua, NH.  We will enjoy a special year-end dinner with special guest speaker Candy Chaplin of the Nepal Children's Health and Education Fund.

Plant Sale crew from 2018

Committees

Our Club has several committees which have fun while keeping us running smoothly!

Membership Committee meeting

Communication Committee meeting

Habitat for Humanity Women's Build

The members of Altrusa of Carroll County support many local non-profits in our area, including Habitat for Humanity.  The  Women's Build is traditionally held the day before Mother's Day when 50 women gather to donate their time and skills in constructing the newest Habitat home.   Our Club provides breakfast and lunch to these hard-working women and men.

Breakfast crew: Beth, Sue, Marsha, Thelma, Kathy

Cathy and Skylar 

Supporting the Gibson Senior Center

Every Spring, the Gibson Senior Center in North Conway provides a "Thank You" luncheon for the Meals on Wheels drivers and other volunteers.  Our Club has traditionally provided servers for this event to help support all that the Senior Center does.

Servers Lisa, Beth, Lorraine and Nancy

District One Spring Conference

Held in Cromwell, CT on April 26-27th, the District Spring Conference was fun and enriching for all those who attended.  Our Club received several awards: 2nd place for the Mamie L. Bass Service Award; 1st place for the Carroll County Chatter Newsletter Award; 3rd place for the Nina Fay Calhoun International award.  Well done everyone!!  A special thanks to those who submitted our good deeds.  The highlights of the conference were the keynote speaker Eric Knight and the many workshops to attend. We look forward to next year's Conference to be held in Beverly, MA.

The Fundraiser Fair was very successful for us as we raised $350 to assist Bishmita, an international student from Nepal whom we have supported for the past few years.  We sold quilted potholders, crocheted scrubbies and felted slippers to raise these funds for Bishmita.

Tri-Club Birthday Party

Our annual Birthday Party celebrating the Laconia, Meredith and Carroll County Altrusa Clubs was held at the Taylor Community in Laconia at the Woodside Building.  Hosted by the Laconia Club, dinner was a delicious buffet with yummy mini-cupcakes for dessert.  This was followed by a remarkable 2-part program on Safety Tips for Women, presented by retired police officer Sharon Cavanaugh.  The second part was a presentation by Robert Young, a 10th Degree Black Belt in Karate on self defense techniques and basic movements to avoid attack.  Lots of helpful information!

Cheryl, Lisa, Cathy, Nancy, Judy, Beth and Jan enjoying the Birthday Party

Demonstration of self-defense techniques.

Membership Committee Hosts a Mardi Gras Social

On Tuesday, March 5th, the Membership Committee of Altrusa of Carroll County hosted a Mardi Gras social for the newest members, sponsors and interested members at the Applebee's in North Conway.  President Diane Robinson, committee members Nancy Spaulding, Peggy Poirier, Marsha Brown, newest member Janel Maxwell and potential members Shawn Rogers and Cheryl Lang gathered for appetizers and drinks in a fun way of sharing Altrusa information.

Nancy passed out Mardi Gras beads for all to wear as we had a great discussion and wonderful questions were asked in this intimate social setting.  Nancy had printed out a copy of the District Service Bulletin (DSB) to pass around which helped to answer a lot of our questions about projects, Club 21, Spring Conference, committees and other clubs in our District.

Some members were unable attend so the Membership Committee will keep you posted on a second question and answer social gathering for interested members and sponsors.  Let's keep the fun discussions going about our amazing club!

Laundromat Little Libraries

One of our very successful service projects is the Laundromat Little Libraries we provide at our local laundromats.  We provide crates filled with children's books for children to read and hopefully take home to enjoy.  We are always in need of additional books, so if you or a friend are cleaning out children's books we are happy to take them to share.

Valentines and Cookies

Our February meeting brought in a small but enthusiastic group with cookies and creative ideas for Valentine Cards.  With warm hearts and bright smiles, our Altrusa members crafted cards for residents of the local nursing homes and assembled trays of cookies for those residents and their caregivers.

Helping the Laura Foundation - Pond Hockey

On January 26 and 27, members of our Club assisted the Laura Foundation for Autism and Epilepsy by working at the food tent during the Pond Hockey Tournament in Madison at the King Pine Ski Area.  The weather was cold but sunny and was a sold-out event with many happy but hungry children buying burgers, hot-dogs and soup.  On Sunday the worker bees were: Cathy B., Cathy S., Cindy H., Pat K., Pat M., Nancy S., Kathy S. and Katie.  If any of the Saturday workers took a photo to share, let me know so I can post it too.