December News

Hi all,

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving Holiday.  We all have so many things to be thankful for and high on my list is our Soroptimist Club. Not just because of the friendships and enjoyment of working together but because we are helping so many women and girls through our many projects.


The wreaths are here! Terry would like everyone to pick them up on tomorrow, Wednesday between 4 and 6 PM at her home, 916 Bolton Circle.  If that time is not good for some members, you can email or call Terry to arrange pick-up at another time.

This week I received my Best for Women Soroptimist magazine. The feature article is on breast Cancer and the costly results. I know that many of us have been touched by breast and other cancers in our mothers, aunts, sisters, daughters, and ourselves. It is an article worth reading. The side bars include symptoms of a little known breast cancer and actions our club can take to help women in our local community.

This Thursday we will be having our regular business meeting at the Baptist Church. It is a sack lunch affair. Business meetings are very important. It is where we make plans and report how we are doing with our projects. If you are not able to attend all the meetings please try to come to the business meeting, the first Thursday of the month. Please print out the Agenda, Minutes and Calendar of Events for reference.

A big thank you goes to Susie and the work that is done to prepare and send out our monthly e-news letter. In an effort for our club members to connect with the bigger picture of Soroptimist our guest author for Dec. is Governor Linda Sue Hansen.

Helaine is collecting children's book for our book project at each business meeting. If you don't have any to donate, talk with Helaine about purchasing some from her list.

At the meeting we will have sign up sheets for the Parlor Tour Dec 4, Bell Ringing Dec 18&19, and gifts for the Rosewood House Christmas Party Dec 22.

December is upon us and there is a lot going on. Hopefully everyone will take part in one or more of our projects but remember, DO NOT FEEL PRESSURED TO DO EVERYTHING. Pick and choose what is important to you.

Correspondence: Chamber Newsletter - Business After Hours, Dec 9 Westamerica Bank 5:30-7:30 and the STAND newsletter

Pres Libbey

NOVEMBER NEWS

Dear Benicia Soroptimists,

Recently I was looking over the SIA club award information. This year they have added a new question to be answered. It is: “Approximately how many women and girls were helped this year by your club”? Wow, what a question! The answer is due June 1st of next year  so I have time to think about it but how can I possibly even guess? 

Well, let’s just look at the month of October. At our business meeting we passed a budget with almost $13,000 earmarked for giving to National, Regional, and Local Soroptimist projects. That does not count the money we raised for the Laughing Workshop, and for what we are planning to raise from Relay for Life and LunaFest for the Cancer Fund, or all the donations we make for projects such as the CAC Thanksgiving Din-ner, the Rosewood House Christmas Party, the cuddle blankets or the books for the school libraries plus the many personal projects such as sending boxes to women troops in Afghanistan. And these are just a few. I could go on and on. How can I possibly count the number of women and girls we help? 

On Oct 20th our club organized a Vigil Against Domestic Violence. We had a good number of members and non members turn out including Sandra the Chief of Police. There was press coverage, and the message went out that our club came out to make a stand. How many women and girls did we help? We would be happy to know that we helped just one but the message we sent out by being there has the potential of helping many more. 

How about the Bewitching Tea on Oct 24? How many women and girls will be helped from the money raised for STAND and Safequest of Solano? 

I’m not sure how I will answer the question when the time comes. There really is no way to know because it doesn’t stop with the women whose lives we touch. It travels on and on through many more lives than we could ever know about. Our mission is improving the lives of women and girls in local communities and throughout the world. The truth is we really don’t stop to count, we just keep helping. Way to go Ladies! 

~Pres Libbey “Grow Your Dreams in Fertile Soil” 

Letter from last year’s Violet Richardson award winner, Florenza Plung 

I am doing great! College has been wonderful. I am currently attending Babson College which is located near Boston. I am pursuing a business degree with a marketing concentration in hopes of starting my own non-profit organization someday or working for one. I will be starting a Rotaract Club this semester and do more fundraising and projects. I've been working on campus and at two interns. One of those interns involve blogging about charities and finding organizations to donate to for the webhosting company I am part of. Hopefully I will make it big here in Wellesley, MA. If you have any fundraising ideas or international projects that you have information on, I would definitely love to hear about it. Of course, I will definitely tell all my friends about the Violet Richardson Award and send out e-mails. Being a Violet Richardson Award recipient is something I am very proud of, and I can't wait to let someone else feel the pride also.