Community Discussion Group Topics*
February 7 - "Family Secrets: Hidden History." Moderator: Diane Bohlander
February 14 - "Immunity to Change." Moderator: Don Heidorn
*This adult group meets every Sunday at 9:30 a.m. in the Founders' Room for fellowship and thought-provoking discussions led by member volunteers. For a more detailed listing of topics, please see the Sunday bulletin.
Daytime Book Club Title*
February 17 - Things Fall Apart, by Chinua Achebe
March 19 - Spite Fences, by Trudy Krisher *This will be held on a Friday so the author can join us!
April 14 - Women of Brewster Place, by Gloria Naylor
*We meet one Wednesday a month, at 10:30 a.m., in the Fellowship Library. We then go out for lunch together. All are welcome!
Evening Book Club
The Evening Book Club will meet at 7 p.m. on Tues., February 8 at Boston Stoker (behind the DLM at Far Hills and Whipp) to discuss The Ghost Map: the Story of London's Most Terrifying Epidemic - and How It Changed Science, Cities, and the Modern World, by Steven Johnson. Our March 8 selection is Birth of Venus, by Sarah Dunant. New participants are welcome. Contact Ann Snively if you'd like more information.
St Vincent de Paul 2ndSaturday Lunch*
February 13 Menu: Beef stew, green salad, fruit salad
*All donations must be delivered heated and ready to serve 15-20 people. Donations should be taken to 120 W. Apple St. by 10:30 a.m. Sign up in the Gathering Space.
Food Fanciers
Sylvia Wince will demonstrate how to make her famous Killer Brownies on February 19 at 2 p.m. in the Fellowship kitchen. All are invited and this is a secret recipe...so if you want to know how to make them, you'll have to come and watch!
Smart Choices
Mark your calendars for our meeting on February 11 at 2:00 p.m. We will have our Midwinter Slump Party, where we will meet in our most comfortable sweats, pj's, etc. Jan Campbell and Robin Farinet will have some surprises for us, too!
Bowls of Hope Soup Supper
Plan to attend the Bowls of Hope Soup Supper on Sat., February 27 at 6 pm. This is a benefit dinner for the Dayton International Peace Museum and the Dayton FoodBank. Pick out a beautiful pottery bowl made by a local artisan and select from a variety of soups ( including vegetarian) donated by some of Dayton's best restaurants: Cafe Monet, C'est Tout Bistro, Coco's Bistro, Flavors Restaurant, The Meadowlark Restaurant, One Lincoln Center, Savona Ristorante, and Thai 9. Specialty breads will be donated by BoosalisBaking Company and Rahn's Artisan Breads. Desserts will be provided by our own Reeve's Catering and Sisters' Catering. Tickets are on sale in the Gathering Space after the service and must be purchased in advance: Adults $20; Children under 10, $10 without a bowl.
Knit, Crochet & More
The Knit, Crochet & More group is kicking off the craftiest service project of 2010. We are accepting donations of knit, crocheted, or fabric squares, roughly 6-8". These will be assembled and donated to Project Linus or another similar charity. We will also accept donations of yarn, however small. The donation box will be in the Gathering Space or in Classroom #4. Thank you!
Small Group Dinners
Enjoy conversation, good food, and fun while getting to know others in the Fellowship. Groups of 8 to 10 gather in each others' home once a month, October through June, for dinner and everyone brings a part of the meal. In March, we start with new groups, so this is a great time to join! Friends and members alike are encouraged to participate. Contact Jay Snively for more information or fill out the sign up sheet in the Gathering Space through February 21.
Chalicelight Gallery
The Chalicelight Gallery is showcasing the work of Cathy Jeffers. Cathy is an artist and a teacher. She works for Dayton Public Schools teaching art to emotionally disturbed children and at Wright State where she is an adjunct professor working with future elementary school teachers to give them the basics of art education philosophy and techniques. Cathy made her first quilt in 2003 and after many years of experimenting and layering, has discovered her unique style. Her work has been shown in Ohio, Hawaii, Oregon, Nebraska, and many other states as well. Her quilt, The Artist and the Mermaid, is now on tour until 2011 with the Quilt National, an international quilt show. The focus of her show is about the many people she's met, imagined, or would like to know. For more information on Cathy, please visit www.cathyjeffers.com.
New Service for Grocery Cards
Want to purchase grocery cards, but don't carry your wallet/checkbook with you on Sundays? Just give Sylvia Wince a call at 435-5079 and she will deliver your Kroger or DLM cards to you and collect your money. The Kroger refillable cards are $5. You add money at the Kroger service desk. The DLM debit cards are in denominations of $20 and $50. You can make checks payable to MVUUF. What an easy fundraiser for the Fellowship!
Calling All Wordsmiths!
If you like to write stories, poems, and prose, and would like to share your work and give/get feedback with other writers, the MVUUF Writers' Group is welcoming new members! Meetings are once a month, usually on Sundays, and consist of discussion, activities, and peer critiquing. Writers of all levels and interests are welcome. If you would like more information, please contact Roger Davis or Marisa Becker.
Service Auction - April 17
What is the Service Auction, you ask? The Service Auction is the biggest fundraiser for MVUUF. Members and friends of the Fellowship donate services or goods, which are then auctioned off with all proceeds going to the Fellowship. It's that easy! What we need from you are goods and services! Need some ideas? Here are some items from the last few years: an African dinner for 6; a close personal parking space at the Fellowship; old-fashioned chicken dinner delivered to your home; architectural services; dog walking; one hour massage at your home; first table in line to get food at the Thanksgiving Dinner...if you haven't been to the Auction, it is LOTS of fun! There's great food and a fun theme to tie it all in...this year is triple the fun (but it's a surprise for now!). If you have any questions, or are interested in helping out with set-up, children's activities, or working the night of the Auction, please contact Kate Halpin.
Wednesday Night Buddhist Meditation
The Wednesday night Buddhist meditation is cancelled until further notice. You can still participate in Buddhist meditation Sunday mornings, 9-11 a.m. in Room #4, or in Zen meditation sponsored by the Zen Fellowship of Dayton on Tuesday nights, 7-8:15 p.m. in Room #1.
Offering for February
The Social Concerns Committee invites plate offerings for the Wesley Community Center of Dayton. The Wesley CC was founded in 1966 during the Dayton race riots and is located on Dayton's West Side. The Center's mission is "helping others through God-centered principles." Although the Center is faith-based, it serves all persons without regard to race, religion, sex, age, or sexual orientation and maintains a non-proselytizing stance. Center programs include after school childcare, scouting, youth leadership development and senior nutrition and transportation programs. The Center also offers self-sufficiency classes, motivational counseling, job preparation, and computer literacy. An important and primary principle of the Center is to enable families and individuals to become self-sufficient and to be able to give back to the community. The generosity exhibited by MVUUF in becoming a supporter of the Wesley Center is most appreciated.
Office Information
Kristin will be out of the office Fri., February 12. She will not be accessing voicemail or email.
Long Range Planning Committee
Have you ever climbed a mountain? Usually, doing so involves numerous places where you stop to take stock and plan your next section of the journey. We at the Fellowship are on a journey up a mountain toward being the most vibrant, engaged Unitarian Universalist community we can be. We will be more likely to get there if we take the time to assess and plan our next steps. That is what the Long Range Planning Committee is all about.
The Long Range Planning Committee was established by the MVUUF Board to engage with the members and friends of our Fellowship to shape and understand better who we are as UUs and how we want our Fellowship to develop in the years ahead. We are not about telling the Fellowship where to go next. Rather, we will be assisting the congregation to do that assessing and planning. We see the congregation as being at a plateau where we can recognize what we are doing well and also perhaps imagine some things we can do that will move us forward on our journey.
Toward that end, we will be seeking your involvement. We anticipate that our work will take a couple of years. As we go along, you will have a chance to tell us about your experience of MVUUF - what draws you here, what feeds your soul, what do you dream we can be. We will use, among other tools, a process called Appreciative Inquiry that will help focus on our positives and then move from there into an even better future.
We anticipate many conversations in a variety of contexts. This process of teasing out what we value and dream about is called discernment. It involves what we want and also what we have to give.
We see this discernment process as exciting. How often do you really get to dream about your life? And then share those dreams? We hope these discussions will draw us all into deeper community as we go along.
Thus far, the Committee has been working on getting to know each other and to begin to grasp what is involved in this large and sacred task. I say sacred because we recognize that you are entrusting to us the guidance of this community of ours. It is a big responsibility that you (through the Board) have given us and we commit to you that we will work with our best diligence, wisdom and care.
Please come to committee members (Ellen Beck, Brittany Fredrick, Lew Hann, Bob Lewis and me) with your concerns and ideas. We will be keeping you informed of our work, so watch for updates. Please participate as the discernment process unfolds. Please join with us, as time goes on, in climbing the mountain together.
~Barb Weber, Chair
