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Parading For Polio

At Ocean Park’s Old Fashioned Independence Day Parade, July 4, 2010

Thanks to Missy Bageant for the photos!

Books to the World

Thanks to Shirley Pryor-Pyne, Bob Hamilton and Bill Halstrum for heaving yet another big load of books headed for 3rd World Countries.  Can we ever say enough good things about the Lockhards, who have designed and championed this project from day one?  [more]

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Ascend in 2010: District Conference

President Dick Fisher and PE Lynn Raymer, along with members Keith & Keleigh Schwartz, Shirley Pryor-Pyne and Ruth Carpenter, traveled to Welches, Oregon for this year’s District Conference. A grand time was had by all!

Here’s a photo of PE Lynn, telling Rotarians about our cooperative project with the Rotary Clubs of Tillamook, Seaside and North Tillamook County, “FOOD FIGHT”, a lighthearted competition designed to collect food for each community’s food bank(s).  North Tillamook County kicked the rest of our back ends!!

Our club participated in the demonstration of club projects, shown on the displays behind Lynn.  Below are Ruth and Shirley, showing our project Board, beautifully put together, don’t you think?  It describes our Thai project that Shirley visited earlier this year, along with ADG Sharon Starr from the Rotary Club of Lake Oswego.

Ruth’s face says it all;  Conference showed her what Rotary was all about and how she could make a difference!

Save the date!  District Conference 2011 in SEASIDE, OREGON!

THANK YOU

Thank you to everyone who came out to bid on the amazing selection of art;

Thanks to District Governor Kristi Halvorson, Administrative Assistant Governor Sharon Starr and Presidents Elect Ellen Boggs (North Tillamook County) and Marian Derlet (Warrenton), and families, for joining us;

Thanks to our partners, the Boys & Girls Club of the Long Beach Peninsula, the North Beach Family Medical Center Dental Clinic, and the Peninsula Arts Association, without whom this event would not take place;

Thank you to each member of the Rotary Club of SW Pacific County Peninsula, for coming together at all the right times and with the right attitudes;

And a BIG thanks to Lesley Ferguson and her Oysters & Art planning committee for producing our best O&A yet!

Oysters & Art: Featured Artists

BARBARA MALLON

Barbara is a local mixed media artist currently exhibiting in Ilwaco and Astoria. Her inspirations come from memories and experiences growing up in the Pacific Northwest. Many of her paintings are strongly reminiscent of marine coastal and benthic environments – the sights and sounds of a lifetime of observations carried out scuba diving, fishing, snorkeling, camping and exploring tide pools and wetlands here in Puget Sound, in Alaskan waters in and around Bristol Bay, and in the tropical waters of the Hawaii islands.

DON NISBETT

Although he was born in Missouri, the artist Don Nisbett has lived in the northwest for most of his life. Specializing in watercolors Don is as versatile as he is talented. Themes include crab, wine, fish, moose, golf, coffee and more. He stays busy throughout the year working on boat paintings, beach house paintings and fantasy portraits as well as other custom and commercial work.

You can find Don at the Crew House Gallery visiting with friends and fans while they sip on wine or enjoy some of his famous chocolate treats. Much of his work is customized while you wait. This is not your usual stuffy art gallery. Selling “Affordable art for real people” is what he does and you will find everyone from local fisherman to tourists are fans of Don’s art.

Don Nisbett’s Crew House Gallery
167 Howerton Way
at the Port of Ilwaco

Tel: (360) 642-8831

BETTE LU KRAUSE

Bette Lu’s adventurous spirit has taken her around the world by sea. As a merchant mariner on research vessels, tramp freighters, large oil tankers, and tugboats, she has explored many of the earth’s coastal regions. In 1991, she joined Lindblad Expeditions, first as a deck officer and a few years later as an expedition leader and naturalist, traveling and teaching in several wonderful destinations. Aboard her own 1934 36’ Monk wooden cruiser, she ‘gunk holed’ and kayaked around many lesser known islands and inlets of Puget Sound, the San Juan Islands, Canada’s Gulf Islands and the fiords surrounding the first nation village of Alert Bay, BC. She has attended several special cultural events among the Kwak’wak’a’wak people. These days she lives in a small coastal town in Washington, and spends time in nature and painting in her home art studio. Much of Bette Lu’s art is inspired by the magnificent rainforests and salt water places of the Pacific Northwest.

Oysters & Art Featured Artist: Eric Wiegardt

One of the Peninsula’s most prolific and well-known watercolorists, Eric Wiegardt has  generously donated his work every year to this event, and we are privileged to offer three of his original acrylics in his signature “loose” style.

With over 25 years of professional painting and teaching experience, and more than 3,000 students nationwide who have attended his workshops, Eric is in demand as an acclaimed instructor, art judge, and juror.

His art carries a strong sense of the Pacific Northwest, but his content comes from wherever he travels, seen in these three works:  the interior of an antique shop, another from the Nahcotta Oyster Plant, and the third a historic view of the old gas house and smoke house as seen from the east window of his gallery.

Visit EricWiegardt.com |  More information on Oysters & Art, coming up on March 20th

THE ANTIQUE SHOP 24 X 30 watercolor

GAS PUMP AND SMOKEHOUSE 16 x 20 acrylic

NAHCOTTA OYSTER PLANT 24 x 30 watercolor

Books to the World Project Update

Click the image for a closer look.  Click here for a print-friendly pdf.

Upcoming Activities

January 23: Beach Cleanup!  9:30 at the Sid Snyder Approach

January 26 Regular Meeting: Boyd Keyser of Ocean Beach School District

February 2Regular Meeting: Shirley Pryor-Pyne will present a program on her trip to Thailand to visit our Akha Children of the Golden Triangle

February 9 Regular Meeting: Joe Devon from Ocean Beach Hospital

February 16 Regular Meeting: TBA; David George

February 23 Regular Meeting: TBA; Guy Glenn

March 2 Regular Meeting: TBA Bill Halstrum

March 9 Regular Meeting: Club Assembly on Oysters & Art

March 20 Fundraiser: Oysters & Art!

Save the Date: March 20, 2010

Oysters & Art is our club’s key fundraiser for the year, a benefit for children’s programs, including the Boys & Girls Club of the Long Beach Peninsula, the Family Health Center at North Beach Children’s Dentistry Program and the Peninsula Arts Association’s Youth Scholarship Program, along with our International children’s projects.

Silent & Live Auctions | Nibbles, Sips & Spirits | Music & Laughter

March 20, 2010 | 5-9 pm | Chautauqua Lodge

Click for a closer look, or download OandAposterflyer011210.pdf

Update from Thailand

From AG Sharon Starr, who is in Thailand with our own Shirley Pryor-Pyne, working on our Akha Children WCS project:

On Friday, we flew from Bangkok to the Children of the Golden Triangle Center, now re-named Children’s Rescue Mission.

Waiting with us for the plane were 80 Asians in red vests that said FIDO DIDO.  I was very curious and tried to ask one of them what FIDO DIDO was.  She didn’t speak English but noticed the Rotary wheel on my vest.  She started calling out to the others in her language and pretty soon we had the whole group surrounding us and chattering like crazy.  A few spoke a little English, and we quickly learned they were Taiwanian Rotarians who have a water project going somewhere near Chiang Rai.  They took lots of photos of us and them  together, and seemed excited to learn we were on a Rotary trip too.  Some are going to the Convention in Montreal in June, and we said we’d try to meet again there.   The red FIDO vests, it turned out, were freebies from their District Governor’s sister’s software company and they were wearing them so it would be easy to spot each other in a crowd.  And of course it was great advertising for FIDO DIDO!

As soon as we arrived at the Center, David gave us the grand tour.  The chicken house (financed by our Club) is finished and filled with 320 red hens.  The hens only arrived a couple days ahead of us and haven’t started laying yet.  The tractor we bought is being used for all kinds of projects.  It has several attachments–blade, grass cutter, plow and disk.  I hopped on it and tried my hand at pushing some dead brush into a pile with the blade.  This was not really work, however–just a photo op for a new website David is planning.

The Aussies who are here right now are putting the finishing touches on a very nice playground, just beyond the pre-school classrooms (for those of you who have been here before).  The kids love it!  Swings, slides, monkey bars, climbing structure, the works!

The new project (there always IS one, isn’t there?) consists of 14 primary school classrooms to be built on land near the new playground.  The land was purchased by the Singapore RC, and now all David has to do is raise $14K for each classroom.  He’s hoping I’ll go back and raise at least enough for one classroom.  Hmmmm.  Any ideas?  He is very anxious to get this done because an Akha girl (age 12) and a Lisue girl were raped by a teacher at the local elementary school, and David is very anxious to pull all his kids out of that school.  The teacher has a history of this at other schools and was shuffled off to this school by another jurisdiction.  The school is protecting the teacher and claims it was the girls’ fault.  Charges were filed, but the police released him immediately and he is back teaching at the same school.  Luckily, nothing like this has happened at the HS, and all is going well there.

Saturday we had a bit of a scare.  Two little boys lit a fire in some dry grass, and it got away from them very quicky and started spreading rapidly toward the chicken house.  The older boys were out there stomping the flames  with their feet and beating it back with bushes and blankets.  We were carrying buckets of water from the kitchen and got it contained fairly quickly, maybe in 15 or 20 minutes.  I was afraid a kid would be hurt and/or those 320 new chickens would go up in smoke before they laid a single egg!  Luckily there was no breeze or we would have been in big trouble.  David got sprinklers set up, and we watered the whole area down for several hours to be sure there were no hot spots left in the grass.

Yesterday we and the Aussies took 26 kids elephant riding and then out to lunch.  The kids were thrilled with this special treat.

This morning I did some gardening.  The beds we worked and planted in April 2008 are still in fair shape, but certainly in need of TLC.  This afternoon Shirley and I inventoried a tangled pile of metal table, bench and bed frames.  Our job was to sort out 20 repairable table frames and 80 benche frames.  Next we have to sand,  prime and paint to  get them ready for new plywood tops.    It was hot, heavy work and I’m taking a rest.  Shirley is at the clinic now doing health checks.  Lynne has been painting lovely tropical flowers on the dormitory walls, with the encouragement of lots of admiring little girls.

So, as usual, just a typical first few days at our favorite Five Star Refugee Camp!