Sunriver Women’s Club FREE Champagne Brunch |
|
Be sure to sign up for the complimentary Member & Volunteer Recognition Brunch on Saturday, June 10 from 9:30 to 11:30 a.m. at SHARC! This event is designed to celebrate all the members and volunteers who make the club social activities and philanthropy programs happen. Registration is due May 24, click here!
There will be a lot of fun activities, such as: a SRWC trivia contest; recognition of 20, 25, and 30-year members; drawings for eight gift cards to local businesses; and fun awards to some of the most notable members.
|
|
Recognizing our 20, 25, and 30-Year Members! |
|
In addition to celebrating all members, SRWC would like to additionally recognize and celebrate those members who have 20+ years of membership at the Member and Volunteer Recognition Brunch. If you have been with the Sunriver Women’s Club for over 20 years, please email the year you joined to membership@sunriverwomensclub.org
|
|
We continued to be amazed by the support of our membership. Your selfless support of time, effort and donations allow us to increase our grants and visibility within the community. Word of mouth by our members, Let's Do Lunch, and Happy and Coffee Hours continue to be the best way to encourage membership. A big thank you to all of you for continuing to support and promote the Sunriver Women's Club.
This will be our last newsletter as your Membership Director and Assistant Membership Director. Lucy and I have so enjoyed meeting you all and talking with you for your new member profiles.
|
|
"It has been my immense pleasure to have served as the Membership Director for these past 20 months. I am excited by the growth of our membership and the new programs we have begun. Thank you all for joining us on this journey and I look forward to seeing all of you at upcoming events and activities." ~ Kathy Garafalo
|
|
"Two years ago I was an SRWC member of only six months' standing who wondered if it made sense to volunteer as a membership assistant for a club that I didn't know well yet. It has been delightful to meet so many of our 329 members, both long-standing and new ones, and a privilege to welcome newcomers, connect members with similar interests, and solve snafus. If you joined the club to meet interesting women and find meaningful service, don't hesitate to jump right in to SRWC volunteer opportunities!" ~ Lucy Hilburn
Your Membership Team,
Kathy Garofalo and Lucy Hilburn
Next month the new Membership Team will be featured. Val Stensland and Ellen Bartholomew are looking forward to continuing to provide opportunities for all members to connect with each other and engage in our great organization.
|
|
Let's Do Lunch: Thursday, June 1
|
|
On Thursday, June 1 we’ll be gathering at El Corporal for Let’s Do Lunch! This is a casual gathering of long-time members, new members, and prospective members. The capacity for this event is 12, so please register in advance by clicking here!
|
|
Cheers to these members who have joined in the past 30 days: Marybeth Collon, Emily Kozie, Karen Noll, and Tammy Smith. We look forward to getting to know you! |
|
Lana Vermillion
With a schedule of alternating periods in Los Angeles and just south of Sunriver in River Meadows, Lana is often on the move. She and husband Gary discovered Sunriver years ago when staying at a nearby campground to visit longtime Sunriver friends while enroute to their property in Idaho.
Eventually they realized they’d rather be in Sunriver, so they moved to their house on the Deschutes River five years ago. Recently her husband’s sister moved here as well. Their son lives in Portland, so she is happy to be near family members in addition to the many friends who are frequent visitors.
Hiking and kayaking are among her favorite activities in this area. She also loves to travel with a group of friends who all have RVs. After 40 years in transportation for the film industry, during which she drove shuttle vans, actors’ motorhomes, and equipment trucks, she retired three years ago. She looks forward to attending SRWC events and participating in volunteer opportunities as her schedule permits.
|
|
Sherry Plaga
While on a yoga retreat in Greece last summer, Sherry met a woman from Colorado who told her that a friend in Sunriver was in a wonderful women’s club. As a Bend resident, who recently moved from Redding, CA, Sherry followed up and was impressed by the volunteers she met at the last Art Fair.
A mixed media artist herself, she has joined the SageBrushers Art Society and looks forward to volunteering at the next Art Fair. She was a histologist for more than a decade, then taught elementary school for 20 years.
Sherry enjoys walking her dog, working out at the Larkspur Community Center in Bend, biking, and this winter she tried snowshoeing for the first time. In addition to retreats for yoga and for Vipassana meditation, she likes to travel. Recent trips included rafting in the Grand Canyon and going on safari in Tanzania.
She and husband, Mark Stopher, are planning RV trips this year to a bluegrass festival in Telluride, CO and a pinot noir festival in Anderson Valley, CA. In the past she has played in bunco groups and would love to join one here.
|
|
Ashley Yeck
Ashley and husband Jared came to central Oregon 10 years ago from the Mt. Hood area for our myriad outdoor recreation opportunities. She’s an enthusiastic snowboarder, downhill skier, and cross-country skier who is in her 10th season as a bartender at Mt. Bachelor. She hopes someday to go snowboarding in Japan.
When the snow melts, she’s rafting with girlfriends, organizing dirt bike campouts with family groups, exploring the Siletz River on paddleboards with her husband, or introducing her 8-year-old son and 6-year-old daughter to the outdoor sports she loves. This summer she’ll be sharing with them her passion for backpacking and for observing nature, especially wildflowers.
Ashley finds that senior citizens and their stories “refuel her soul,” so she finds fulfillment in her volunteer work as the event coordinator for the Alzheimer’s Association’s Walk to End Alzheimer’s each October in Bend. She is looking for other women to join the walk.
When her schedule permits, she hopes to resume some favorite crafts, including crocheting, making holiday wreaths, and creating stained glass mosaic windows.
|
|
Carol Lockhart
After retiring five years ago following a career in southern California as a consulting electrical engineer, Carol reflected on fond childhood memories of camping trips in Oregon. Realizing that she no longer needed to remain in the big city for professional reasons, she transplanted herself to the Three Rivers area.
In Long Beach, CA she volunteered for many years at a historic rancho site. Here she indulges and supports her love of wildlife by volunteering at both the Sunriver Nature Center and the Second Tern.
Hiking and walking her two Pomeranians are favorite outdoor activities. She’s also a quilter, and has recently taken up knitting again after a 50-year hiatus! Historical fiction and true stories are her favorite reads.
Carol appreciates the friendliness of the people in this area and looks forward to meeting new people through the SRWC’s Sunriver Knitters and Hikers, her knitting group in La Pine, her participation in planning the Community Picnic in July, and soon a new SRWC Book Club.
|
|
Leslie Jeldness
The next time you’re near Circle 3 and notice a woman coaxing a chill Airedale terrier/poodle into keeping up with a chihuahua/schnauzer who wants to race, say hello to Leslie. At age 18 she left her hometown of Boston to study horticulture at OSU in Corvallis. It was there she met husband Jerry who introduced her to the beauty of central Oregon.
For the next several decades she visited this area in the fall on vacation from her landscaping work. A layoff in 2017 was an opportunity to search for employment in another field she loves, and she became a fitness instructor. She and Jerry live in Tualatin, and plan to be full-time residents here by next year.
Leslie is an avid birdwatcher and enjoys hiking and snowshoeing. She is looking forward to trying cross country skiing next year. As someone who loves “being social” and as a reader with particular fondness for mysteries, biographies, and most fiction, she’s also enthusiastic about joining an SRWC Book Club and participating in many other club activities.
|
|
Babette Lary
It has been 50 years since Babette and husband Hal began their married life in Eugene. That half-century has taken them to Germany (where he was stationed for three years), to southern California (where he worked in the film industry), and back to Eugene. This summer they’ll celebrate with a golden anniversary trip to Africa.
Babette’s entrepreneurial bent has nurtured three careers: as a wedding décor provider, a short sale business owner, and an independent travel agent. The pandemic pause in travel gave her time to focus on her family, whose newest member is her 1-year-old great-granddaughter.
She made her Sunriver home her full-time residence in 2021 and loves to hike and kayak. She has also begun volunteering at two nonprofits close to her heart: Furnish Hope, a Bend-based organization that provides home furnishings to those in need, and the Sunriver Stars theater group, where she has been props manager, stage manager, and costumer for shows.
Babette has been in some type of choir since 7th grade and welcomes suggestions for local singing groups.
|
|
Diane Harris
During her childhood on a large Yakima Valley, WA cattle ranch, Diane’s father brought the family to Sunriver so the children could learn to ski. Her work as a flight nurse with the US Air Force took her all over the world. Assignments included nurse exchanges in Thailand and the United Kingdom, in addition to conflict deployments. But her home was McChord Air Force Base in WA, from which she continued to vacation in Sunriver. She bought a condo in Tennis Village in 1985, and her current home on the Deschutes, south of Sunriver, in 2000.
Now, semi-retired, she does some telehealth nursing from home, but is out on the river in her kayak every morning. Diane continues to enjoy downhill and cross-country skiing and looks forward to hiking with Mid Soles and Hearty Soles.
Another one of her passions is fishing. Her late husband was Australian, and they fished in New Zealand and Australia during annual visits for many years. This year she’ll be fishing in Sitka, AK and will take her RV to Winchester Bay in September for a month of crabbing and fishing at the Oregon coast.
|
|
Pam Young-Wolff
After more than 40 years in Santa Monica, CA working as a photo producer/assistant with her photographer husband, David, Pam moved here three years ago to live among her beloved pine trees at the north end of Sunriver. She walks her yellow lab on the bike paths daily, and the Sunriver path to Benham Falls is a favorite route.
Though her two children and two grandsons remain in CA, she is happy to have family nearby. The sister she previously visited in Bend before retirement has now moved to Sunriver as well.
Pam loves any outdoor activity, and is exploring Oregon through hiking, mountain biking, kayaking, and camping with a new mini-camper. When indoors, she’s interested in a variety of crafts and is an accomplished and ambitious cook who prepares homemade peanut butter, bread, pasta, and ice cream!
|
|
Marybeth Collon
After vacationing in Sun Valley, ID from Michigan for 30 years, Marybeth and husband David looked throughout the West for the perfect retirement spot for their active outdoor lifestyle. They found it in Sunriver.
She loves to hike and looks forward to Hearty and Mid Soles outings. An avid road biker already, she has added mountain biking to her repertoire since coming to Sunriver. Marybeth skis both downhill and cross country and would love to meet other women in the area who downhill ski as well.
Marybeth retired three years ago after a career as an attorney. She keeps up with sons, who live in Los Angeles and Salt Lake City, and with her black lab puppy, with whom she enjoys exploring the national forest. Her other pastimes include working in her yard, reading, listening to podcasts on a variety of topics, and assembling intricate wooden Liberty Puzzles.
|
|
Emily Kozie
Ever since she discovered Nancy Drew books as a child, Emily has loved reading, especially well-written mysteries. She relishes the exposure to new authors and genres that book clubs afford and looks forward to joining the next SRWC Book Club.
Her appreciation for new things extends to cooking and travel as well. Her kitchen features bright flavors, ethnic cuisines, and lots of vegetables. Whether it’s a cruise ship to Tahiti, a national park road trip, a visit to her son and granddaughter in Portland, or a sojourn in Palm Desert, she’s an enthusiastic traveler. Her next adventure will be a fall trip to Apulia, Italy with her sister.
Emily and husband Dan began vacationing in Sunriver in 1984 from Seattle, built a home here in 1999, and have been full-time residents since last November. Hiking, biking, and kayaking in the Cascade Lakes are among her favorite pastimes, which she plans to resume as soon as she and her Brittany Spaniel both finish their concurrent knee physical therapy!
For many years Emily volunteered with Seattle Children’s Hospital, and she is interested in the SRWC’s many volunteer opportunities.
|
|
Linda Rowles
Through many years of involvement with the PEO Organization, another women’s group that combines social events and philanthropy, Linda knows how much fun and fulfillment it can provide. Having retired in April, after a career in human resources and office management in the tech industry, she looks forward to spending more time in Sunriver and becoming involved in the SRWC.
She and husband Greg divide their time between Beaverton, where they are closer to their two sons, and the Sunriver home they bought in 2014.
Linda has been a downhill skier since age 5 and has skied often through the years at both Mt. Hood and Mt. Bachelor. She prefers to hike and walk when Greg is out enjoying his passion of fly fishing and hunting. Gardening is also a favorite activity, and she wants to learn how best to do it in central Oregon. She’s also excited to take up golf and pickleball.
When not outdoors, Linda loves to organize spaces and coordinate events; her experience in organizing corporate events and high school reunions will find ready application in SRWC activities!
|
|
Karen Noll
As a California girl who spent 18 years living in Anchorage, AK and Seattle, WA on the Pacific coast and another 19 years in Alexandria, VA on the Atlantic coast, landlocked central Oregon might seem an unlikely retirement locale for Karen. She enjoyed exploring Northern Virginia by bicycle and weekends spent on their sailboat on the Potomac River, Chesapeake Bay, and Puget Sound. However, when she came to Sunriver for a family reunion 25 years ago, it became her preferred vacation spot.
Karen spent many rewarding years teaching middle school, but when she and her husband Barry retired in 2019, they came to Sunriver to be near family in the area.
Karen stays busy with walking, biking, fitness, and travel, including road trips to Claremont, CA and Whidbey Island, WA to visit children and her grandson. Genealogy, cooking, reading, and research are among her other pastimes.
Karen looks forward to meeting new friends as well as participating and volunteering in SRWC events.
|
|
May Events
SRWC May Luncheon & Program
Tuesday, May 16
11:30 a.m. at Crosswater
Art Meets Wine in the High Desert
May 15 to May 20
Celebrate Oregon Wine Month while supporting Sunriver Women's Club!
Coffee Meet and Greet
Tuesday, May 23
10-11 a.m. at Brewed Awakenings
May Birthday Lunch
Wednesday, May 24
11:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Village Bar and Grill
Registration Due: SRWC Member Appreciation Champagne Brunch
Wednesday, May 24
Come enjoy a celebration for you! This free event on Saturday, June 10 from 9:30 to 11:30 a.m. will celebrate and thank our members for their continued membership and volunteer contributions. Click here to register
June Events
Let’s Do Lunch
Thursday, June 1
Noon at El Corporal in the Village at Sunriver
Happy Hour
Tuesday, June 13
4 to 6 p.m.
The Village Bar and Grill
Coffee Break
Wednesday, June 21
10 to 11 a.m.
Starbucks in the Village
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
