We once again this year surpassed the 500 mark in membership and one of the reasons this club works is the due to the great volunteers we have – we had this year over 40 different individuals volunteer to help us with registration, 50/50 draw, Christmas Party and dinner, golf outings, our annual golf tournament, and Bunco tournament and we would like recognize some of them.

Laura and Ray Bowen – these 2 keep all of our assets at their house, bring them to every meeting, set up the coffee and then head up our clean up effort after the meeting and in addition organize and run our night golf outing every year.

Wendy and Maurice Poirier – this couple has acted as the conscience of our club for a few years now and organizes and supports our monthly collection of food and used clothing for the charities we support, takes care of the decorations for our Christmas and Valentines Parties – this year being helped by Bernice and Mark Zahringer and in addition Moe’s alter ego – Alley Oop comes by and helps with our social efforts at those parties.

Paul and Judy Rivenbark – have been with us pretty well since the first year which was 7 years ago – Judy working the registration desk and Paul selling 50/50 tickets

Heather and Herman Janssen – have taken over the Christmas Party meal and have organized this the past 4 years even cooking stuffing one year – they also have run the annual Bunko tournament since it is inception 6 years ago and this year provided every one of our golf tournament participants with a Canada hat.

Kathryn St. John – who this year organized and coordinated our ladies lunch group who met bi- weekly for lunch at Demshars and with Sally is putting together a book club for us next year.

Bonnie and Rudy – another couple that have pretty well from day 1 volunteered to do anything we need – working the registration desk, clean up and taking care of our cake needs for our annual Christmas Party.

Dorothy and Jim McCann – our Scottish mates who also help out any way they can

Jacquie and Charles Ruigrock – our friends from Calgary – again doing anything we ask and this year taking over and absolutely killing the task of running our 8^th consecutive sold out golf tournament. Also their golf committee – Paula Wilde, Bill Penney, Mavis and Russell Combe, Linda and Wayne Kelly, and Hazel Shackleton.

Sally and Lionel – Sally volunteered to take over as club photographer and photo editor has done a magnificent job, check out her work on this website – and of course Lionel keeps us all entertained with his Gordie Howe sweater and smart remarks but is always there to help if needed.

Jim Bacon – our Santa Claus and for a long time now one of our sergeant at arms help us directing traffic at the front door every meeting and last but certainly not least Helen Horsman who also from Day 1 has helped out anywhere we needed. We thank each and every one of you as well as anyone who I neglected to mention that volunteers from the bottom of Pat’s and my heart – without you we just would not exist.

We also want to acknowledge John Alden who also has been with us since the start – volunteered to put together our Loonies & Toonies website that he keeps current for us and since that time we have had over 16,000 hits – it is a wealth of information not only for club info but for snowbirds info including a link to the 8840 form we must fill out if we spend more than 120 days a year in the US, was our club photographer for many years and organizes our weekly pickleball program

Pat Irving has asked to retire from her position of secretary treasurer for the past few years – it is a lot of work keeping our database, acting as treasurer watching our money closely – if you spend money on the club’s behalf you have got to have a receipt, printing name badges each month for new members or replacing ones that got lost, taking and making phone calls, organizing the registration desks each month [she told me that with all of the speakers we have had over the years she has only heard about 3 of them because of being busy behind the scenes counting out money and preparing the 50/50 envelopes while they were talking] and most of all trying to keep Dave in order, only to be talked out of it until now. This year is her last in that position we are going to miss working with her very much. In appreciation for all of the hard work Pat and her sidekick Brian have done these past 8 years we presented them with a plaque which says “ In sincere appreciation for co-founding and volunteering for 8 years” and a gift certificate as a token of our appreciation and thanks for all you have done.

We then elected a new executive for the 2018 – 2019 season:

	Dave Horsman returns for his 9th year as President
	Lionel Mantha was elected as Vice President
	Hazel Shackleton was elected as Registrar - Treasurer

Our 50/50 winners were:

Bob Ford , Bedford, Nova Scotia - $ 75 - donated back to the club

Louise Lankoff, Orangeville, Ontario - $ 50

Anonymous - $ 20 - donated back to the club "

For all the details, click HERE

Our 7th Annual Christmas Party Report

We had 222 Canadian Folks come out to celebrate Christmas at our 7th annual Canadian Loonies and Toonies Christmas Party on Dec 13 at La Hacienda - food catered by Bob Evans in Brownwood was terrific and were able to get everyone served in about 20 minutes.

We had a few special guests - all the way from the Village of North Pole - Santa Claus and from Mallory Square our own member of Clown Alley - Mr. Alley Oop - along with our musical guests Nina and Safia who were fantastic and closed their show at 9 pm with renditions of “The Prayer’ and ‘Time to say Goodbye” the popular Andrea Bocelli duet songs he did with Celine Dion and Sarah Brightman.

We had drawings for food baskets for those of you that preregistered and 8 people/couples walked away with nice baskets or restaurant vouchers as well as our winners of bottles wine for the best dressed lady and gentlemen of the evening - Ron Radwick from Chatham, Ontario and new member Beverley Booth from Belleville, Ontario.

All the winners of the pre registered and 50-50 draw winners
Click here to see all the party photos

Our 50/50 program raised $ 750 which allowed us to award 5 - $ 75 prizes to - Mike Vrebosch from Sudbury, Ont., J. P. Hatnean from Windsor Ont., Carolyn Walsh from Huntsville, Ont., Elenor Kyle, from Kenora, Ont. and our Moncton Bankroll made up of mostly one dollar bills to Heather Adams from Thornbury Ont.

We are of course are a most generous lot of people and we once again stepped up with over 150 toys which we gave this year to Camp Sozo for the unfortunate kids who live in Ocala National Forest, their pickup crew was indeed very grateful as well as a lot of food stuffs for the Wildwood Food Pantry and used clothing and household wares for Bargains and Blessings.

We wish you all a vey Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

Click here for coming events
Ladies, how about a Canadian women’s lunch group - interested? Click for details

Background music "The Villages Shovelin' Sunshine Song". Written by Ted Merthe, Mark Merthe & Shawna Harrington. To see the video click HERE