Thank you, Melany (our banquet coordinator), for putting together another FABULOUS banquet for us last night. We missed everyone who wasn’t able to come. I think everyone enjoyed the kid-free evening, friends and food. Below is a quick re-cap of what I talked about last night 😉
We’ve had another great year! I have been so impressed, once again, with all of the events we’ve had on our calendar this year. MSMAC quite literally saves my sanity – I need to get out of the house and go spend time at someone else’s house for awhile to talk, give my kids new people to play with, and not have the same routine day-to-day or week-to week. Thank you for being such fun moms! Melany got small gifts for each of our monthly coordinators. If you were not at the banquet, I will do my best to get your gift to you before the end of the summer.
We had another great year with our philanthropy projects – Bookbags & Christmas gifts for SCAAP, and most recently two car loads of donations to Tender Care. Tender Care gave us magnets for everyone as thank you’s, and I will try to carry them with me this summer to pass out to those of you who may not have been at the banquet.
Speaking of years, MSMAC is celebrating its’ 10th anniversary this year! We’re planning to host an ice cream in the park celebration for our families, so be on the look out.
And now, for some statistics about our fabulous group 😉 Earlier this year Angela took some time to profile our group and came up with some interesting statistics – our ages span 20 years and we have from 1-4 kids, with the majority of us having 2. We have members in 8 towns from Fairfield to Hanover, from Littlestown to Aspers & East Berlin. Our longest member has been in MSMAC for 10 years (Congrats, Barb Hanna!) with most of our current members joining in the last two years. We are up to 42 members as of the end of April – the biggest MSMAC has been since I joined 6.5years ago. The majority of our current members found MSMAC through a friend or acquaintance, but the internet is quickly catching up as the way people hear about us. Most of our new members this year have found us from Google searches and our website, and for this I think we have our current board to thank. All of my board members have been awesome about embracing technology – moving our website to a new host, updating the website, moving our calendar to Google, getting PayPal up & running, instituting an online registration form, using giftser.com to keep track of philanthropy needs. Truly MSMAC would not be the same, run as well as it does, or be so much fun without them!! I gave some small gifts of appreciation to everyone on our current board – again, if you weren’t able to be with us last night, I’ll make sure to get your gift to you.
After our board meeting next week I will be stepping down as President. With William (my youngest) starting all-day preschool at St. Francis in the fall, I feel that I should pass on the baton to someone with younger kids who will be attending more play dates (although I hope to still come to things when I can, even if I have to come by myself!!!). I have loved being president this year, and actually for the 4 years – interrupted for a few years when William was born – that I have done it. Growing up, and even in college and working I was always very shy and had a small group of close friends. When 6 years ago I got talked into being MSMAC president after only being a member 4 months, I felt so empowered – like now that I’m president, of COURSE I have to go to all these events & talk to people! I love planning and organizing, which is just what MSMAC presidents do, and I have really, really enjoyed meeting all of our members and being welcomed into their lives and homes. I think that being MSMAC president really has changed me as a person and as a mom – for the better! Plus my closest friends now are those that I have made in MSMAC. So thank you for the opportunity!
Melany also had some small gifts for our incoming board (welcome to Sara H., our new president, and Amber N., our new Philanthropy Chair!!). Those gifts will be distributed soon as well if you couldn’t be with us.
I hope to see everyone this month at our various play dates, get -togethers, and even SWIMMING!
Katie L.
