2 Days to Go

Well, here we are at crunch time, and here I am at 2:30am again blogging! Things are coming together slowly and quickly at the same time. We have a great base of volunteers for all areas of our day, the exception being hair and makeup in the afternoon. But I am sure that these will also come together in the 2 remaining days as we have been working on filling the spots. Laura will be at the church on Friday evening to set up a few things with those who are willing to come in and do it then. For all others, it will be a mad rush at 8am Saturday morning. Please, if at all possible, avail yourself for a group photo (or possibly a few) before we start our day. If you are one of those who are starting later in the day, please make sure you have your photo taken so that we can try to add you to the group shot afterwards. Anyone who knows anyone who is willing to bring along food, we would be very very grateful for anything. We do have quite a bit of food, but based on last year's experience, we can always use more. Savoury things like sandwiches, pizzas, veggies, meat and cheese trays, and fruit (a box of oranges would be great!) are where we are lacking more. Please also remember to label any dishes or things that you want to get back at the end of the day.

We have made a tentative schedule for the volunteers and have emailed a couple key groups of people who need to bring specific equipment. For the rest of you, if you are a photographer, please bring your cameras and flashes etc, and if you are a general volunteer you will be told where to be on the day of. Anyone who has funny hats or things to make kids laugh, bring those along, or any other props that may be useful (remembering to label everything!) When you arrive, please see Simran Bains, our volunteer coordinator, who will let you know where you need to go and what you need to do. Laura and Tamara will be everywhere at once ;-) and I'm sure things will be great!

There are probably going to be media there as well as several photographers taking candid photos for us. Be aware you may be on camera, and also please be sensitive and aware of guests who are in situations that require confidentiality. This year there are A LOT of these individuals. We have close to 100 amazing volunteers. Feel free to use the opportunity to network with each other and to learn from each other. So far we have around 300 people registered to have their photos taken, with more on the way, as well as walk-ins on the day. I am guessing we may hit close to our target of 500-600 people. The day holds great promise. Looking forward to seeing you all there!

More Great News!

So, we started out the morning with one bit of good news, and we were going to post about that on it's own, but the good news just kept coming, so we thought we'd just make one post to cover it all up to date, and to fill in any of you who were not able to make it out to our meeting this last Sunday.

First of all, thank you to all those who were able to make it! We had a huge turnout this time, bigger than we had expected, and so sorry to those who did not find a seat. It was great chance for us to meet those of you we didn't know already and for you to meet us and everyone else. Without all of you volunteers (both those at the meeting and those who couldn't be there) we would not be able to do any of this, so thanks for being so great!

So let's get to the news:

1. This morning, Rick MacDonald and his wife JoAnne, contacted us to let us know that they and their company Nutrilawn will be covering the cost of the screen printing on the volunteer's shirts this year. So this means that all those who have filled out the Volunteer Registration Form by the time we have ordered the shirts, will receive their shirts for free! We will be ordering a few extras, so others may get lucky, but the shirts will only be guaranteed for those who have registered in time. Thank you so much Rick and JoAnne for this!

2. We have a gift basket that is being donated by Shoppers Drugmart that they have made for us to raffle off to cover coupons for each guest offering them 5 more 4x6 prints (or equivalent) in addition to the 5x7 that they will receive at the event. Today we received confirmation that Great West Fitness have agreed to display the basket and sell raffle tickets for a full week to help raise money for this purpose!

3. Today we purchased 4 printers, plus enough ink and paper to allow us to print one 5X7 photo per session on Dec. 10th. And we still have funds left over from TWU's generous donation to cover other costs that come up either before or even on the day!

4. Thrifty Foods in Abbotsford have agreed to donate baked goods for our event. And Save-On Foods sumas have donated a $50 gift certificate for the store, which we are thinking of using to purchase any items we are missing a day or two before the event, or possibly some fruits and vegetables that we can cut up on trays for our guests.

Looks as though things are really beginning to come together! We are getting really excited about this year's event!