|
President’s Message 
President Warren Weaver’s Message:
Fellow Lions, Friends of the Elk Grove Lions Club and our Community.
We started the month of December with big plans for our sponsorship of the Parade of Lights along with our December Crab Feed. Our inability to control the weather resulted in the City of Elk Grove making the decision to cancel the parade on the 3rd of December. We will apply to the City to be able to host the parade next year.
The following Saturday morning, December 10th, our Lions were busy at the Albiani Recreation Center with our monthly pancake breakfast as the rest of our group gathered to bring the needed equipment to the SES Hall for our annual Shrimp and Crab Feed.
This year was a first for the club as we had partnered with the Elk Grove Optimist Club to put on our dinner. Bad weather almost caused the cancellation of our crab feed. When we showed up at the SES Hall, they were without power, as was about half of Elk Grove. With fingers crossed, we got started on the prep work. The lights did come on, but that was short lived. They were off in less than an hour. We were still hopeful and continued with our preparations.
We had a sell out and were very hopeful that SMUD would get the power back on. Finally, by mid morning, the power was on and it stayed on for the rest of the day. We had a very successful crab feed and are looking forward to another great event next year. A special thanks to all of the volunteers from our club as well as the Optimist club. They managed the front of the house while we managed the kitchen. It was a great partnership. Also a special thanks to Sky River Casino for their donations and support as well as our friends from the Strauss Festival who, as usual, purchased two full tables of tickets. Thank you Jackie Lewis and Raelynn Springer for your support.
With that success behind us, we were now looking forward to our annual Christmas Dinner that we put on each year for our Lion families on the 12th of December.
It was a great evening with a visit from Santa with presents for the kids. Another great event. Thanks very much to Lion Don and Crew for a great ham dinner.
To end the month with a bang, two of our members, Lion Sharon and Lion Lorene worked on Operation Santa Clause to provide Christmas for two families.
Finally, the Sky River Casino hosted a giveaway event for the first of 10 local nonprofit organizations in Elk Grove. They hosted 10 wreaths on their Wreaths of Hope wall. Out of the hundreds of non profit organizations, they selected 10 because that was all the room they had for their contest. Each of the organizations were given a frame to create their wreath. Because of some confusion about which 10 organizations were selected, the Lions Club teamed up with our friends at the Optimist Club as one of the 10 nonprofits. Unfortunately, we were not one of the top three winners. Every organization was a winner as they all received a donation from Sky River Casino. The top three were:
1st Place: Paws For A Purpose
2nd Place: Elk Grove Food Bank
3rd Place: Project R.I.D.E.
Read more about it here.
All together, it was a great month. Coming up in the next month or so are the following:
Lions Education Foundation Soup and Salad fundraiser on the 28th of January, District Meeting on February 4th and the Delta Lions Club Celtic Tea on the 11th of March. Our District Convention is set for April 21-23 here in Sacramento.
We also have a few requests for service from other organizations in our community. We are providing a bar on the 21st of January at the High Tech Center for Elk Grove High School Baseball. We may be assisting the Strauss Festival with their Spring Tea on the 4th of March. We are doing the bar for the Soroptimist at their Martinis and Merriment event on the 25th of March.
Sincerely,
Lion Warren Weaver |
President Warren Weaver
District Governor Tim Luckingill