In Search of our Thanksgiving Newsletter...

Happy Holiday Season!
Well, we had a really fun newsletter folding party right before thanksgiving - lots of volunteers came to help, we got them done quickly and I mailed them that afternoon! BUT...some have reached their destinations and some are floating around in what the post office must refer to as the "Holiday Mail Rush"...
So if you didn't get your newsletter, please let us know and we will mail you another one...some took as long as 2 or 3 weeks to arrive...so maybe some are still on the way...I hope so, but we can sure send you another one if needed.

Some important information out of the newsletter to remember: Our office at Faith in Action Caregivers Northwest will be closed from December 20-January4, 2009. We will not be providing any rides during this time so our volunteers can enjoy a well-deserved break and enjoy time with their families. Clients are encouraged to call us now with their January appointments, so if you are a volunteer driver, it would help us if you could remind your riders this week and next to call us with any early January ride requests.

Another note from the newsletter: We have a volunteer who has offered to match any monetary donations from other volunteers (up to $500 total) from now until December 31, 2008. So if you are looking for a wonderful non profit to donate to this Christmas season, consider making a donation to Faith in Action Caregivers. Did you know that $24.96 provides a ride to a senior neighbor to the doctor or grocery store? You can donate by mailing us a check (in the envelope in the newsletter if you got one) or you may also now donate online through our paypal link on this blog and on our website at www.faithinactioncaregivers.org.

Have a very blessed and safe December!

It's December? Already!?

Well, now I KNOW times flies when you are having fun! It's already December! And we're still having fun!

Hope everyone has received their newsletter. The bog of "holiday mail" slowed down the newsletter delivery; we mailed them before Thanksgiving and some people just got theirs today. The newsletter has the dates that we will be closed in December but just as a reminder, our office will not be open the week of December 22 and December 29. We'll be back answering the phones, scheduling rides and searching for drivers on January 5. There will be no rides provided for our clients during these last two weeks of December, so our volunteers can spend time with their families. The only exception is we will be driving our dialysis patients, so if you happen to have a little bit of time and could provide a one way ride to someone in the Cedar Park area, please call our office.

Please take some time to slow down this holiday season and enjoy the fun parts, ignore the stresses and eat lots of chocolate...oops, that's my plan, but not a bad one! I just have a hard time with the slowing down.

Our final Senior Day Out for 2008 is December 11 at Hope Presbyterian Church. Our Caregivers Board of Directors is cooking for this one, and we will be entertained by an awesome men's quartet, Medallion (could one of those guys be a driver for caregivers?) It should be a day full of good food and fun!

Carla "trying to slow down" Young - Executive Director, FIAC Northwest

Thanksgiving!

Now I am not sure what happened to October! After tomorrow, our office will be closed for the Thanksgiving holiday, and we'll be back in December! Hard to believe that Monday will be December!

We are having a fun newsletter folding party tomorrow - tacos, fun, fellowship, etc. - we couldn't get these newsletters out without the help of our volunteers! Look for your newsletter in the mail...and keep an eye out for a Christmas letter...

We had a fantastic Volunteer Appreciation Coffee a couple of weeks ago - 48 volunteers came by to enjoy some great coffee, cupcakes and to meet other volunteers. We'll make this a regular event, at least quarterly...if not more often.

I wish a happy Thanksgiving to everyone, eat lots of Turkey, Gig Em Aggies! (at least we'll win half time!) I'll miss march-in this year, signed up to help deliver thanksgiving meals from Bethany UMC to some of our Caregivers clients, but I get to watch the game on my parents giant TV in Llano on the "ranch"

Carla :-)

What happened to October?

Wow! Time to take a deep breath! We are so blessed to have so many great volunteers (but we always need more) that have managed to get our very busy senior neighbors to all their appointments this past couple of months. We are grateful for the new volunteers that have come on board, and hope that everyone received their invitation to our next Volunteer Appreciation Coffee for November 10th. We mailed postcards and also emailed Evites, so if you didn't get either of those, please call us!

Yesterday, I got to talk to 100 6th graders at Cedar Park Middle School about the importance of volunteering and what they as kids can do to help our organization. It was fun to hear their suggestions of things they can do for our clients - they were very excited! This particular group has to do 3 hours of community service for their advanced language arts project (they are studying societies) and had several different non-profits come talk to them, so lets hope that some of them will pick Caregivers to give their time to!

I am working on a fall newsletter - hope to have that done in the next week - we'll have a newsletter folding party and I'll send out a notice about that - fun, fellowship, folding and breakfast tacos...volunteers needed!

Carla :-)

What a busy week of busy seniors and volunteers! We managed to get everyone where they needed to go - each week that's a challenge!

We also were able to provide a pick-up of prescriptions and delivery of a wheelchair for an evacuee from Port Bolivar, who lost everything in Hurricane Ike...

Hope everyone has a restful weekend - we continue to add many new clients that need help getting around so be sure and tell your friends about the opportunities to volunteer with us - we would love to have them as part of our awesome volunteer force!

Thanks for all you volunteers do - we appreciate you! Keep your eyes open for an invitation to another Volunteer Appreciation coffee - coming soon!

Carla

Guess what?

Just a little FYI - last year in September, FIAC Northwest provided 189 round trip rides - this past September, 2008, we had an amazing 391 round trip rides! This the most rides ever for us...our rides have increased consistantly all year long! Tell your friends and neighbors - we need more volunteers!

Another week of many drives!

To help keep our volunteers, donors, clients, and other friends up to date on all that we do at Faith in Action Caregivers Northwest, I thought I would start a blog! I'll try to keep you up to date about all we are doing, how many rides you (volunteers) provide - you will be amazed, and other fun news about events we might have coming up in the future! So check back every so often, I might not get to it each day, but will try to stay on top of things!