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About The Blue Mountain eagle. (John Day, Or.) 1972-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 9, 2017)
A8 Seniors Blue Mountain Eagle Wednesday, August 9, 2017 G RANT C OUNTY S ENIORS John Day Seniors Nicky Essex On July 31, David Pasco and I were greeting, and the First Christian Church served us. Pastor Al and his wife, Cathy, and Becky and Rick Rhinehart kept us well fed and with choices of milk, butter- milk, juice and, as always, lots of coffee. Pastor Al and Rick Rhine- hart took meals to our friends in John Day and Canyon City. Michael Hagopian and Rod- ney Bruser from Step Forward took the Mt. Vernon route. In total, 27 regular meals and 34 frozen meals were delivered. Cathy Altnow led our salute to our flag to open our time together. Veanne gave some announcements, mainly about our new doors, which need more time to complete installa- tion. Once again, there will be no senior lunch on Aug. 21 be- cause we’ll be serving brunch for our parking lot campers for the eclipse. Carl Swank won the free meal. Heather Swank won the Len’s Drug gift certif- icate. The Harrison Ranch Pro- duce certificate went to Becky Rhinehart. Pastor Al prayed the bless- ing for our meal of biscuits and gravy, sausage links, scram- bled eggs and tropical fruit. As always, Shay and Lisa put out a very popular meal. We served 23 diners. On Aug. 4, Bonnie Kocis and Jeanette Julsrud manned the front desk, and the Naza- rene Church did a great job of serving a huge crowd. Shay, Lisa and Veanne managed to feed an additional two full ta- bles and a couple of “end sit- ters.” Serving were Trace An- drew and her twin grandsons, Aiden and Elliott, Dale and Corrine Stinnett and Jessie Elliott and grandson, Brogan. Others pitched in to help due to the numbers. Veanne is a regular workhorse. She acted as hostess, emcee, server and, later, mop girl. I doubt those are in her list of duties. Corrine led us in the flag salute. Lisa Pereira is selling tickets to benefit Lake Creek Camp. Only 250 tickets will be sold for $50 each, and the win- ner will get $400 per month at Chester’s for 12 months. That is $4,800 in groceries. You singles could share a tick- et. Just saying. In our regular drawing, Vickie Harrison won the free meal at Valley View, Carolyn Olson won the Ches- ter’s Thriftway certificate and Alva Conlee won the Harri- son Farms Produce certificate. Dale Stinnett led us in the blessing for our meal, and we dug in. We had roasted pork with potatoes and carrots, gra- vy, French bread, watermelon for National Watermelon Day and birthday cake donated by our friends at Driskill Memori- al Chapel. Our entrée was pro- vided by Mobile Glass. Thank you all. I do want to mention our unexpected friends. Carolyn Stout brought Carl who tried to pretend he didn’t know her. There were Athena and Na- than Moline and their guest, visiting from Wisconsin, Kitty Stark; Chris and Kris Labhart brought their granddaughters, Madison and Lindsey; and a large contingency came from Prairie City, Judy Bracken, Carolyn Olson, Rhonda Ber- nard and, from Twin Falls, Jerry Williamson, aka “Old Man.” Don’t call him that here, or you’ll probably get 40- 50 old men yelling, “What do you want?” Thanks for playing bingo with us. Micah 6:8 NIV “He has shown you, O mortal, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you? To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God.” Monument Seniors Soo Yukawa Can you believe that we are already in August? To me, this is the last month of summer. Won’t be long now before fall and winter will be again upon us. But I guess we still need to get through some events com- ing up first. Our cooks Terry Cade, Car- rie Jewell and Christy Howell made us our delicious meal of spaghetti, garlic bread, fresh green salad and cookies for our dessert. I was extra hungry from not having any breakfast that morning so I savored every bite. Thank you to our won- derful and hard-working cooks that feed us so well. Our greeters were Bodean Andersen, Jimmy Cole and Marva Walker. Bodean led us in the flag salute, made the an- nouncements and prayed the blessing over our meal. Bob Blakeslee has stepped down from serving at the greeting table. Thanks, Bob, for all your devoted years of service to Monument and its citizens. Jimmy and Marva took care of the accounting books. We had some visitors. Char- lie Blakeslee, Bruce Strange’s grandson Gabe and Veanne from John Day. Veanne point- ed out the same concerns about the upcoming eclipse event and to be prepared with extra food and fuel. We had 56 guests on our books and seven takeouts. Yup, I’d say we definitely had a full house. The free meal tick- ets were won by Olivia Hood- enpyl, Theda Phelps and Rickie Doland. We had some incident with our freezer going out sometime last week. We have many to thank for their quick action and help in avoiding what could have been a disaster. We ap- preciate Betty Richards and her son, Bill Richards. We thank Heather Riggs for noticing the problem with the freezer. We also thank Terry Cade and her family, Riley and Eri- ca Cade, Mary Cade and Cody Zyph, for the assistance in moving the frozen cases of food from the school back to our se- nior center freezer. That was no small feat during the extreme hot temps we were having. We appreciate all the concerted ef- forts of everyone and their help. Again, thank you to all. We also want to thank David Stubblefield and Bob Cockerell for putting on a new switch on the cooler, which saved us a bundle of money. Jimmy Cole is now the new chairman of the Monument Senior Center board. Karen Stubblefield is the new secre- tary. Linda Abraham and Loni Lawrence are also new mem- bers to the board. Thank you all for your participation and for volunteering. We appreciate everyone for their dedication to the Monument Senior Center and community. The eclipse event will be happening in just two weeks. Hopefully, people from the city will learn to appreciate the beauty of the country out here. Maybe, they will get a glimpse of the slow and peaceful life of Eastern Oregon and go back home in envy of our lives out here, just a thought. Psalm 42: 1-2 “As the hart panteth after the water brooks, so panteth my soul after thee, O God. My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God.” Prairie City Seniors Rose Coombs Signs that you live in a small town: waiting for the ducks and geese to cross the road and avoiding the spooked deer on your walk to the post office. Isn’t it lovely? Es- pecially after hearing that a Portland rush hour is now 4-6 hours long. I was driving to meet someone, and they won- dered what delayed me. Hmm, had to wait for three cars to pass before I could get on the highway. That’s rush hour in Prairie City. Last week was Larry Wright’s birthday, and this week was his and Carla’s wedding anniversary. My, my. Also, Clayton and Beverly Curtis celebrated their 50th with an event at the hall. Con- gratulations all around. Alaina DeHart led the flag salute, Jack Retherford asked for the blessing and Bob Meador won the $5 gift certificate donated by Prairie Hardware. The Lakes brought in some zucchini to give away, and our home deliveries were made by Carlos, Larry and Ken. Veanne made announce- ments about the eclipse and left some information. The two most important items were be prepared and get the proper glasses. So you have been warned. Take heed. Our meal this warm day had lemonade, iced tea, or- ange juice, milk and coffee before we got to the Swiss steak and sauce over noodles, tarragon carrots, rolls and, for dessert, a blueberry smoothie – without added sugar. Mmm, good; 63 people registered for this delicious meal. Lorna and Krystin brought Marilyn Randall, Otho Lau- rance, Joan Metlock and Bud Salisbury from the Blue Mountain Care Center. Fran- ces Fannon came to eat with them and friend Bud. Anoth- er visitor was Roy Hill who came with Jerry and Evelyn Sheets. Good to see you all. Come back again. Derrol and I cleaned out the grass and trees in the big hole behind the hall. We did that so that when the contractor exca- vates for the new handicapped landing pad, he will have a place to put the dirt and rocks he has to remove. You didn’t know that we were going to have a new handicapped land- ing pad? We didn’t either until the state of Oregon Building Codes Division said we had to. This is one of those simple projects that turned into more than we had imagined. But when it is done, it will be a great asset to the hall. So Joel came and got the area marked for the pad and the holes dug for the ramp supports. Things are moving ahead. Remember, most things take longer than you think they will. Don’t forget the dance the hall will be open for on Aug. 18, with music by the Copper Ridge Band, starts at 7 p.m. Entrance and refreshments can be had with a donation to the Prairie City Senior Center. What a deal. When you read this, it will be Grant County Fair time, so get yourself in gear and at- tend. Titus 3:1 “ Remind the peo- ple to be… ready to do what- ever is good…” Church Services In Grant County Come Worship with us at
