ON with another club year!

Have you ever heard of the NCADV?  Since this new year will mark the beginning of our signature project against domestic violence, all your clubs should begin new projects to aid your state chapters of the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence.  You can find your state info at:  http://www.ncadv.org/resources/StateCoalitionList.php

Here in Illinois, we have had the director of the ILCADV speak at our convention last spring and at our summer state board meeting.  We’ve been doing projects to raise money to help fight child abuse for years, now we are going to help get to the root of that problem by fighting the domestic abuse that usually results in ‘child abuse too.

The most startling thing I learned from our speakers is that a great deal of the problem stems from unsympathetic judges.  Although we try to be fair, statistics show that over 80% of the MALE judges will not let domestic abuse be used as a defense in court.  FEMALE judges are just a little better, not as open to listening to abuse cases as we would like.  But they are a little better.

The conclusion:  elect female judges and WATCH all judges.  We need some active programs to keep an eye on our judges, report to the public their actions, and to educate the judges on domestic abuse issues.

Please educate yourself and your club on the signs and symptoms of abuse!

As Jackie Pierce says:  Look to your left, look to your right, one in 3 women has been abused.

Here is a quote from an email I got from her good friend Karel Volpert:  “Good news!  Christy had twin baby girls last Thursday.  They weighed 5 lbs.14 1/2 oz. and 5 lbs.15 oz.  The babies are doing fine and look exactly alike.  I got to see a phone picture of them today”

Christie has spent the better part of the last several months hospitalized and on total bed rest.   Let’s all keep them in our prayers!

The disaster there has moved me to watch the news continuously for days now.  The horror is unspeakable.  I think we are all being moved to try to help in some way.  But which charity will make the best use of our cash?  At this early stage, all the media is begging us to keep our “stuff” and just send money.

I want to ask all of you to send some amount of money, no matter how much, to some charity that will primarily look after the children.  That’s one of the things that makes GFWC unique.  We are always thinking of helping children.

The first news show I listened to asked for contributions to UNICEF.  The lady being interviewed said that the first thing UNICEF does when they help in a disaster is to gather the children and try to reunite them with their parents.  Then they concentrate on the essentials:  water, food, blankets, shelter.  You can contribute by going to http://www.unicefusa.org/

When I posted this information on the GFWC FaceBook page, Janice Adler mentioned that Plan USA is also a partner of GFWC and can use your funds for Haiti.  Here is what I found on the Plan USA site about Haiti:  “Plan Haiti is accounting for staff in the capital and its 10 program units, including three units in the quake zone to the south of the capital. Plan is preparing to deploy staff for assessments and emergency response starting on Wednesday.

Roger Yates, Plan Director of disasters and humanitarian response, said: “Of all the countries in the region, Haiti is the most vulnerable . . . . Our priority is assisting children and their families and getting people at risk into safe accommodation wherever possible.”

Plan will also be working to help ease the psychological trauma caused by the disaster, as well as ensuring that children are protected throughout the recovery effort.

Plan has worked with children, families, and communities in Haiti since 1973. It currently implements child-centered community development programs featuring Health, Education for Girls and Boys, HIV and AIDS, and the Rights of the Child.”

I found this information and a link to donate to Plan USA at: http://www.planusa.org/contentmgr/showdetails.php/id/1188742.

And I just heard on the radio that many phony charities are trying to capitalize on this tragedy.  Please be sure you know where your money is really going.  Both UNICEF and Plan USA take almost no money out of donations to run their organizations.

I urge you to donate SOMETHING today to aid the survivors in Haiti.  These two charities are our partners here at GFWC and would be excellent choices for your generosity!

Back to School

It is “that” time of year again!! School is getting back into session and everyone is falling into a routine again. Here are some reminders for ensuring safety of schoolchildren everywhere this year:

1.Make sure coats, lunch boxes and backpacks are labeled. But, DON’T put your child’s first and last name on the outside of clothing and bags!!! That gives predators too much information!
2.Remind your child of safety precautions and procedures prior to school starts! Example: Never leave school with anyone that you don’t know or that your parent didn’t authorize directly.
3.This is the perfect time to establish or reinforce family emergency procedures.
4.And this one is for everyone whether they have students or not…..DRIVE CAREFULLLY!!! The start of school means more traffic, children at bus stops and school buses on the road!

Additionally, let me suggest that your club make an Education activity a priority these first few months. Take up supplies for needy students or offer to sponsor a local classroom….I promise you that the students AND the teachers will greatly appreciate it!

Ralph Waldo Emerson once said, “Not in his goals, but in his transitions is man great.” In my life I have learned quite a bit about transitions. I have transitioned from being a friend, a girlfriend, a fiancé, to being a wife and from being a babysitter, mother-to-be, and then a mother. I have also learned how to evolve from college graduate, stay-at-home mom, sandwich artist, clerk, and newspaper editor. With the writing of this the inaugural edition of Callie’s Chaos, I am starting a new transition, to publisher of The New Stamford American.

Out of five generations of the Richards family, I am now the fourth generation to hold this title. If you lived in the Rule/Rochester area in the 1950s and 1960s, you might remember a friendly newspaper man that always had ink around his nails from spending so much time at a linotype machine and printing press. His name was Alton Richards, he was my grandpa, and he was the owner and publisher of the Rule Review. He came by the profession naturally, his parents, H.R. and Dora Richards as well as his grandfather, W.H. Richards, all helped to bring the Anton News to life. So it appears that the one thing I did inherit from the Richards side of my family was that my blood is full of printer’s ink and tends to run more black than red.

I have picked the name Callie’s Chaos, because that describes my life perfectly most of the time. I once described the word CHAOS as Can’t Have Anyone Over Syndrome. Often my life is an ongoing battle to defeat the ever present dust bunny, monster pile of laundry, and the waste land that is known as the playroom. A wise man once said,” You need chaos in your soul to give birth to a dancing star.” It has been through my various transitions that I have learned that chaos can sometimes be the mother of invention and the thing that helps you to laugh when everything is going wrong and your child has just said the craziest thing you have ever heard.

I hope you will enjoy the journey that we are about embark on together as much as I and my wonderful team have enjoyed putting it together. The New Stamford American wants to be part of the life of Stamford, sharing good things with you, being a part of your lives. And we want you to be a part of American, sharing your good things with us. We are glad to be here. We hope you are glad to have us. We are located on the north side of the square, so come see us.

My club sponsors an absolutely amazing project each year.  It is a Student Art Festival held at one of the local high schools every spring.  Hundreds of students from all the feeder junior highs and from the two high schools enter their art creations.  Projects from almost every conceivable medium are presented.  Our club provides ribbons for first and second prize from each school, plus a $50 prize and ribbon for each of the Jr. and Sr. Visitor’s Choice and Best of Show awards.  We also donate $200 to each school for the teachers to buy materials of their choice.

The Festival is held on a Friday night from 6:00 to 8:00 at the high school.  Our club members bake cookies and brownies and we provide coffee.  There is no charge for any of the refreshments.  You can view over 100 photos of the student projects at http://picasaweb.google.com/gfwcillinois/2009AntiochStudentArtFestival# The young lady who won Best of Show this year is a senior and won last year too.  Thankfully, she’ll be majoring in art in college.

This activity is a perfect time to promote the club in our community.  We always get a lot of questions about who we are and what GFWC is all about.

Honestly, I am not sure I can kill all the lawn dandelions in time for the tour. Our second harsh winter in row has decimated our climbing red roses, sigh.   I will be hard pressed to change all the burnt out light bulbs.  Why do light bulbs burn out in series?

I hope to have a This Place Matters poster placed prominently in the clubhouse windows by the middle of this May.  GFWC is participating in this program with the National Trust for Historic Preservation [NTHP]. The April/May 2009 issue of Clubwoman magazine features this great idea on the front cover.  I have special plans for the picture we will be posting soon with humans in front of the clubhouse. I encourage all GFWC clubs with historic [50 years plus old] clubhouses to print a sign, pose your members and post the photo to the NTHP site.  Let’s celebrate women’s history. This Place Matters <!– /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:”"; margin:0in; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:”Times New Roman”; mso-fareast-font-family:”Times New Roman”;} a:link, span.MsoHyperlink {color:blue; text-decoration:underline; text-underline:single;} a:visited, span.MsoHyperlinkFollowed {color:purple; text-decoration:underline; text-underline:single;} @page Section1 {size:8.5in 11.0in; margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in; mso-header-margin:.5in; mso-footer-margin:.5in; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} –>
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Callie and her Benny having a moment at Dinosaur Valley National Park.

As a parent I never ceased to be amazed by the fact that the very ones we are supposed to be teaching are the ones that are in fact teaching us. For spring break this year, my two boys, ages 6 and 4, one set of grandparents, and my husband and I all made the two and half-hour trek to Glen Rose, Texas, which is home to Dinosaur World and the infamous dinosaur footprints at Dinosaur Valley State Park. These dinosaur footprints were instrumental in showing paleontologists how dinosaurs walked in prehistoric times. Previous to this discovery in the 1930s, scientists thought dinosaurs walked like alligators.

It was on this trip that I learned several things. The first thing was that sometimes it isn’t about reading all the signs and knowing all the facts, it can really be just as simple as oohing and aahing about the awesomeness of the dinosaurs. When I was pointing out an allosaurus tooth, Logan informed me that yeah he knew it was a tooth, but could we please move on, mom!

Ben, 4, also brought to my attention how imagination and blind belief are not something lost on the young. At one point while we were standing next to a footprint, I pointed out that right in the spot where Benjamin Allen Metler was standing, a dinosaur had also stood long ago. To this Ben got really excited and asked, “Do you think he was looking for Benjamin?”

The trip may have lasted only a day, but I know we all walked away enjoying each other’s company and that of our dinosaur buddies. Plus I learned to listen very closely to my kids; after all I might just learn something!

Chetelaine's Keyring

Two years ago I took on the house superintendent job at the Spokane Woman’s Club. I was given a few [4 or 5] keys on a ring. I found a big 3” inch key ring for the clubhouse keys that was easy to grab with my arthritic hands. I thought I was set. My spouse, Phil, and I decided to map and chart the clubhouse locks. Trying the keys in many various rocks revealed that the set of keys I had was very incomplete. After extensive rooting around in the clubhouse office, hours of trial and error putting keys in locks, and then gaining the trust of some suspicious members who had sole copies of keys, I had an almost complete set. The key ring was evolving.

We have long term renters with storage closets off the main stage, and I found that I had to acquire copies of their keys too. One summer day there was a wedding. The Folklore Society of Spokane had left their storage closet unlocked. A wedding guest, arriving directly from the airport via taxi put her suitcase, purse with ID and cell phone in the that closet. Someone from the FSS came in during the wedding, put something away in the closet, locked it, and left. Well, I got a call about 10 PM that evening from the exhausted and desperate mother-of-the-bride complaining about the guest’s luggage. It was not a pretty scene, oh my, but dealing with renter psychology is a subject for a different blog day.

The stranded guest was a librarian who had flown in direct from a conference on the east coast. She was going to stay with a friend of a friend in Spokane that she had never met before. Her only contact information for that person was …locked in the FSS closet. I made many phone calls and could not find a soul from the FSS to come in and unlock the closet that night. It was 11 PM and the wedding party was out-of-there. Guess who got to house a very nice librarian that night in her guest bedroom? She was very sweet and insisted on making a donation to the Woman’s Club. [Maybe I should start a Bed and Breakfast for stranded Woman’s Club guests as a fundraiser] Yes, I need a key to every door and cupboard in the clubhouse.

Finally, I had to fire the clubhouse janitor. And change out the main exterior clubhouse locks immediately. That’s when I made the discovery about how many people had keys to the clubhouse [most of whom should not have had keys at all]. The three adjectives to describe the now thwarted ex-keyholders angry, sheepish and relieved. But that too is another story. Now I have a complete set of keys.

Before I went to the hardware store for Ryan’s key I was choosing the right key off my chatelaine’s key ring by feel, appearance and position on the multiple interlocking key rings. It was time consuming to find the right key when a third of the 24 keys are identical in appearance except for the cut edge. The evolution of the clubhouse key ring continues. Today, thanks to Ryan’s homecoming, the keys I use most are color keyed. Last night, I did a midnight prom party close out at the clubhouse. I saved at least 10 minutes using my newly marked keys. Thank you for coming home Ryan, I got to bed a little sooner last night because of you.

Callie with Logan, 6. Logan was diagnosed with Autism 4 years ago.

I have a confession to make. I suffer from a problem that I am sure many women on this website can identify with. It is one of anxiety. Four years ago I left my husband of five years. There were many problems with the marriage, but the main reason was that our then 2 ½ year old son was diagnosed with autism. This news was like a glass shattering. It was devastating as parents and my ex-husband took the news a lot harder than I did. To him he had lost his son, and this was something he could not and to this day still has not recovered from.

When the decision was made for the boys (I had a 2 ½ year old and 9 month old) and I moved back to Stamford, we did so. We lived with my ex-husbands parents for a while and finally moved into our own little three bedroom house in Stamford. I was a wreck. I had been a stay at home mom for the three years previous to that and I took a job working at the local Subway sandwich shop. About two months after moving there I had my first panic attack. From that point on anxiety had always been a factor in my life. It is like the elephant in the room waiting to jump on me should I get too overwhelmed by life’s daily task.

Recently I have had several health scares and they have brought back the anxiety monster to haunt my days and sometimes my nights. It is sometimes hard to reconcile the woman that takes care of her family, does a very high profile job of being the editor of the local newspaper, as the woman that is laying in her bed at night her body shacking from the latest panic attacks.

If you have ever suffered from this, you know that just telling yourself you aren’t going to give into the anxiety doesn’t do much to correct the problem. For me the answer is the loving support of my husband, Michael and the love of God. There is a wonderful song by the band Superchick, called “Crawl (Carry Me Through)” In it the singer tells about what she does when she is hurting and how when she is crawling through something God is crawling with her and then he carries her through the situation. If not for God carrying me, I am sure that there is no way that the woman could beat the anxiety that lives within her.

If you are dealing with anxiety realize that you are not alone. I think more people than we realize deal with some form or another we are just often afraid by admitting it, we are weak. Honestly after a week like this last one, I feel very weak and tired, but looking into my husband’s eyes and my children’s beautiful faces and I find all new reasons to get through the anxiety.

It is very important that I explain something here. I have a four bedroom/ 2 living area house that is home to 2 adults, 5 children, I miniature horse, one overweight beagle, one cat, one turtle, one rabbit, and a fish named Pete. There is always an ongoing battle to defeat the ever present dust bunny, monster pile of laundry, and the waste land that is known as the playroom. A very wise man once said, “Housework is what a woman does that nobody notices unless she hasn’t done it.” To that comment I say, “Preach on brother.” Another comment comes to mind. If a woman cleans a house and nobody sees it, was it really ever clean? This predicament is a conflict of how do I be a good mother, wife, friend, newspaper editor, marketing director, clubwoman, and all around person in this state of CHAOS?

When I have the answer to that question I will be sure to let you know. I know one thing for sure, getting out of CHAOS doesn’t happen overnight, it takes baby steps, and it also takes the realization that being all the above named things is WAY more important than my house looking like Martha Stewart lives there. I can tell you that this is something that my little organized heart has to take a deep breath over daily.

A very good friend of mine in San Angelo was known for her scatterbrained ways, and most of all the disarray of her home, partially because she had five children all under the age of six. She was an integral part of a ministry I was involved in and she actually wrote a column one time titled, “A friend loveth at all times, except when her house isn’t clean.” She struggled constantly with the idea that she didn’t feel like she could have people over to her home because of the chaos that was always found there.  Her dust bunnies weren’t just bunnies, they were things that ate bunnies for breakfast, think full-blown dust wolves.  

Her approach to the situation was to take each day as it came and find other ways to minister to people than have them at her home. She didn’t stress over the state of her home, and she was still able to be a good leader.

Now you would think that God in his infinite wisdom would have thought about things like cleaning, but I guess it doesn’t say in the Bible that on the third day God created dirt or the vacuum cleaner. After giving this much thought and contemplation, I figured that the only solution was to move to a completely sterile environment, like one of those white rooms that you see on futuristic movies. There would be no dirt and maybe we could all wear disposable clothing that we could just throw away after we wear them….one can only dream. But until I find that great clean home with no dirt and no chores like laundry, dishes, or horror-of-all-horrors toilet bowls to clean, I will be content to blare my favorite Sheryl Crow CD, pull back my hair and go bunny hunting. Don’t call me a housewife, I prefer Domestic Goddess.