Halloween Party

Our annual Moms Club of South Hill Halloween Party was a bag of treats for families and their kiddos!

The kids came dressest in their finest costumes and enjoyed a pizza party and a craft table. The girls looked pretty as can be in their twirly princess dresses, crinkly ballet tutus and galloping pink unicorns. Stamping and coloring seemed to be the activities of choice for many of the girls.

Meanwhile, the boys, mostly dressed as superheroes, did a good impression of their various characters complete with action noises and make-believe fights! Then they raced off to save the world

and fight the bad guys together!

Musical chairs was the game of the day and provided lots of laughs for both the kids and the parents. The kids enjoyed the music, although many of them didn't seem to realize they needed to follow in a circle and instead wandered off to various parts of the room, leaving more than enough chairs for all the remaining players :)!

The cupcake decorating was a big highlight of the party and after all the sugar, the kids received party favors and we auctioned off the raffle basket. All told the proceeds from the raffle raised $49 for our upcoming Thanksgiving service projects!

If you are a stay-at-home mom in the zipcodes of 98373 (south of 512), 98374, or 98375, join us for the rest of our Fall fun! Contact Lissa at mvp.momsclub@yahoo.com to find out how you can become a part of Moms Club and participate in our activities and exciting service projects! Hope to meet you soon!

Apple Fest!

It's Fall! This week the Moms Club of South Hill celebrated by hosting an Applefest!

Applefest was a chance for Moms and kids to enjoy the fresh fruit of the season in all kinds of yummy ways!

The kids cored apples (with some help from the Mommies:) and set them out to dry on our special apple dryer. Then we picked some apples from the backyard to make apple necklaces.

The dried apples were a huge hit with kids and Moms alike!

With their tummies full, the kiddos played together while the Mommies sipped on Mulled apple cider and munched on Baked Apples and Apple crisp, enjoying some much needed chat time!

If you are a Stay-at-Home mommy in the zipcodes of 98373 (south of 512), 98374 or 98375, don't miss out on any of our fall fun! Contact us at mvp.momsclub@yahoo.com to come check out an event! We have lots of fun Halloween activities planned and are looking forward to working on our Thanksgiving service project! Hope to meet you soon!

October President's Letter

Happy Fall Ladies,

This is my favorite time of year. I love the change in the weather, the falling leaves and the routine that is happening as the kids settle into school, which by the way, my boys are loving. October is a big month for my family. We have a few birthdays and my anniversary is this month. Doug also takes two weeks off every year to spend with the family. This year will be a little different with both boys in school, but hopefully we get some organizing done in the house. (It’s a thought.)

As always, we have a great calendar this month. We have a lot of fall-themed events. One of our favorites is the game night. This is always a huge success, and we have a ton of fun. We also have a pumpkin patch tour, pumpkin decorating, and much more.

Don't forget to use the goodsearch.com search engine to do all of your searching and purchasing. We will not benefit much this year, but next year we should be able to use it to help with our service projects. Right now with the economy the way it is, it’s so hard to help out where it is needed because we are all feeling the crunch, too. So every little bit helps. If you have an idea for raising money for upcoming service projects, please let me know. We have applied for grants, but as we know, they are not guaranteed.

I hope you all have a great month, and I hope to see you at the upcoming events!

April Bankord
President

Moms Club of South Hill chapter

August President's Letter

Happy summer ladies,
Summer is finally here and the weather has been great. We have been spending a lot of time at the park or in our back yard. I hope you are all enjoying it. First, I wanted to thank everyone for the help and support they have given to Ali M. We have set up meals to be taken to her twice a week until the baby is born. I have had the chance to visit her and talk with her on the phone and she is so very thankful for everything. This is what MOMS Club is all about, supporting one another in time of need or any time. It is great to see we can come together as a group and make a difference in someone's life. The activities committee has come up with a great calendar this month again. We have a ton of outdoor activities going on. Park days will be on Wednesdays all month, and we have a water park day and a sprinkler day, too. Hopefully this great weather will stick around for that!! We will also be having playgroup sign ups at the August Meet & Greet. We did this a couple of years ago and it worked out great! Everyone picks a number and goes in that order to sign up. Playgroups are a wonderful way to get to know members and have your kids interact with other kids, something they don't always get with us staying home. I have participated in playgroup for about 2-1/2 years and it has been great for me and my boys. I hope you are all having a great summer, and I look forward to seeing you at this month’s activities.
April B.
President

July Presidents Letter

Hi Moms,
First, I want to thank the outgoing board for a great year. It was great serving on the board with them. Also, thank you to those that came to the End of the Year Banquet and saw the changing of the board. We had a wonderful turnout. I am so excited to have the chance to be president. I will be working with a great board this year. We also have a lot of people who have volunteered to be "chairmoms" or help out with committees. MOMS Club is completely volunteer based and the more people that we have involved, the better we can be. Every person involved can bring
new ideas that another person may not have thought of. Thank you to all of those who have decided to volunteer.
We have a great calendar for July. We have a trip to Point Defiance Zoo and Northwest Trek, along with hiking at Mt. Rainier. We also have several park days throughout the summer. I look forward to seeing a lot of you at activities this summer.
Thank you for the opportunity to serve you as president this year.
April Bankord

Service Projects Update

What a great baby shower!!! We delivered two trunks full of items to Care Net. On top of items our moms brought in, we had $40 in gift cards and cash given so April and I went to Wal-Mart and picked up many packages of diapers and some outfits too. Thanks to all the moms who donated items. They were greatly appreciated.
-Kerry

This year was a great success for the March of Dimes walk. We raised $977 in total. The snow may have scared a few people away, but we did have some very dedicated walkers. We had Mandy Huffman and her husband Evan, Heidi Sweet with her 3 kids, and myself with my husband and two boys. We also had a non-MOMS club member walk on our team this year and raise $700 on her own. Tonya R. (a personal friend) received a $500 donation from her work Pierce Commercial Bank and an additional $200 from her coworkers. Thank you Tonya and everyone else for coming out and helping us raise money for this great cause.
- April

Thanks to everyone who participated on service projects this year and helped to make them a big success!

June President's Letter

Happy June, MOMS!

I can’t believe our MOMS Club year is over! This has really been a crazy year for me, and I want to take a few minutes to acknowledge and thank everyone for putting up with me and showing me so much support! As many of you know, I went back to school as a full-time student this year, and after taking 60 credits over the last 9 months, I will finally graduate this month. I have also spent this year serving on the board of Firgrove PTA and the Puyallup South Hill Co-op preschool. I could never have gotten through such a busy year and stressful time without the support and kindness that I received from all of you! Thank you all from the bottom of my heart.

This year our chapter has been lucky to have an awesome board, and I have been blessed to have each of them step up and do an amazing job. Each of them has really helped our chapter grow and develop into something that I know we are all proud of! They have given their time, energy, commitment and love to this chapter, and I really believe that it’s a better chapter for having each of them! In addition, they all have become a second family for me, and I love all of them and their kids dearly.

I am sad to be leaving my job as president this year, but I am so excited for the new board to take over and continue to grow this chapter from the amazing creation that we’ve all built. MOMS Club is so unique, so special, and so needed in all our lives and our community. I am so proud to have been a part of this incredible organization and to have been a part of this year. As my kids get older, I hope to still find activities that I can attend with them and alone because I would so miss the camaraderie and understanding that no one but a fellow MOMS Clubber can give!

Thank you all for such a fun and exciting year, I am blessed to know each of you and I look forward to the coming year – April, you’re going to do a FABULOUS job!!

Jill - President

May President's Letter

Happy May, MOMS!

Can you believe summer is almost here? This year has flown by so fast, and now it’s May and we have so many fun and exciting things taking place for our MOMS Club family. It’s the time of year for our annual End of Year Banquet, which is an amazing time for us to get together with our friends and celebrate what a wonderful year we’ve all had.

We’ve done so many great service projects, helped our chapter grow and found ways to meet the changing needs of our chapter’s moms! This year we are going to treat ourselves to a private dinner at The Ram. Please keep an eye out for more info including an RSVP date!

A big thank you to the nominating committee this year for taking on the big job of contacting every single member and asking if they are interested in running for a position next year or nominating someone for a position. We’re going to have a great ballot for next years board thanks to all your hard work!

We also have fun activities this month; be sure to check the calendar for all the fun. I can’t wait to take advantage of all the nice spring weather and head to the park, check out some new activities, and just enjoy being outside! I hope that I get a chance to see all of you at some of our upcoming events.

Jill - President

April President's Letter

Happy April MOMS,

Spring is in the air, and with it comes the sense of change and new beginnings. I am very excited for the start of a new MOMS Club year and the election season that is upon us! I have been blessed to be president of this amazing chapter for a little over a year now, and I have truly enjoyed it. I have loved being able to get to know each of you on some level or another and getting to watch as our chapter has grown and changed and developed.

Now I am excited to pass the torch onto another member to continue leading our wonderful chapter. As the election process continues, I hope each of you has a chance to really think about what position you’d like to take in the coming year, whether it’s running for a board position, a committee chairMOM, or just becoming more involved. MOMS Club is really an amazing thing – it’s whatever we all make it.

When we all get involved and help our chapter succeed and grow, we all benefit from it. I know that our board members this year have really loved being involved and watching so many of our members step up and get involved in committees, service projects, and starting new ideas like the babysitting co-op. This has really been an amazing year, and I am so grateful to all of you for allowing me to be a part of it. In the meantime, we still have a lot of fun things going on this month, too. Check out the activities calendar for some exciting spring break activities, and a very cool MNO – Rock ‘n Bowl!!

***A big thanks to our activities planning committee for putting together another fun and fabulous calendar.***

Jill

President

Spring Service Projects

Spring is always chock full of service project opportunities for our chapter. The March of Dimes walk is coming up and our chapter has walked in it every year since we started. We have also been thinking of throwing a baby shower for CareNet the crisis pregnancy center.

Keep an eye on this post for updates about what our chapter is doing to help the community this spring and ways that you can support it!

March President's Letter

Hello MOMS,

I can't believe it's already March! Spring is going to come, and then you'll blink and it will be summer again. It's funny how fast time flies when we're caught up in the day to day of our lives. Spring time brings some exciting times to MOMS Club, and to moms all over. For many of us, it's the time of year to start thinking about school for next year. Crazy, but true. Preschool start enrolling in March, and as you can see by our Question of the Month in this issue of the newsletter, that's a topic on the minds of many moms. It's also the time for Kindergarten registration. I have done this before, but I am still nervous and excited about going through the process and sending my little man off to Kindergarten in the Fall.

Not only is it time to start thinking about school for next year, but for MOMS Club Moms, it's time to think about running for a board position for next year. Our nominating committee will start working in March to gather the names of interested MOMS, and we'll announce them at the April Meet & Greet. In May, we'll hold our elections and the new officers will get inducted at our End of the Year Celebration in June. After serving on the board many times, I always get excited as we head into election season for MOMS Club - it's great to have a chance for all of our MOMS to get involved, either running for the board, or for a committee “chairmom” position. Look inside this newsletter for more info on the election process as well. For those of you who want a break from all that seriousness, we have a ton of fun activities planned for this month, too. We are having a Chocolate Making moms night out - just in time for Easter, the babysitting co-op ready to roll, and we'll have our introductory meeting this month as well. Wednesday after school activities, a Jello party, a trip to a new play place - Rainy Dayz, motor club to Ikea, and even the beginning of our new book club are all fun and exciting ways to spend this month!

Have a great month,
Jill
President

Happy February, MOMS

Valentines Day is around the corner, and it got me thinking about the different ways we love, and the many people in my life that I love.

There is husband love - and sometimes that is the hardest to keep fresh and strong when you have a few little kids running around, dishes to be done, meals to be cooked, and laundry piling up. It's an important one, though! My mom always told me that the best gift you can ever give your kids is the example of a strong marriage to look up to. Letting your kids see how a happy relationship works sets them up for happy relationships as they grow up. She also used to say that some day, even though it feels like it's lightyears away, your kids will grow up, move out, and move on... and you are left alone with your spouse, so you better hope you still not only love each other, but really like each other, too!

There is Kid Love - and I think that is the easiest of all, and takes the least amount of work. We all know there are days that they drive us nuts, and we think they are crazy little munchkins and wonder how we'll get through the next 10, 15, or 18 years... but they give us that big grin, cuddle up on our laps, and all that intense love comes right on through us. They are a part of us, and there's no way to turn that love off!

There is also Friend love - and that's the one that I think is the most fun for us Stay at Home Moms. We get to form these bonds with each other, and relate to one another in a way that is so hard for other people. It's so nice to know that when you show up at a MOMS Club activity when you're having a hard day, or just going through a phase that is stressing you out that you'll have a group of other moms that know what you're going through. Having that kind of understanding and support is what MOMS Club is all about.

One way we can show our MOMS Club family how much we "Luv" them is to participate in our chapter's annual "Luv" fest! If you remember back to October when we "Boo'd" each other, it's the same idea. At some point, during the first two weeks of February, you will be Luv'd by another member. When you get your special treat, it's your job to pass that MOMS Club Luv on to two more members and show them how much you appreciate them with a small token on the porch. Remember to keep it anonymous and enjoy the fun!

We have some fun activities coming up this month, too - We're going to check out a new jumping/play place in Sumner, Jumpin' Jack and Jill! MNO is going to be fantastic, one of our members is going to teach us a Zumba class. For those of you who haven't tried it, it's a fun latin inspired dance class that is great for all abilities, even me, and I am VERY uncoordinated!!!

We also have a speaker coming to our Meet and Greet, Prof. Greg Brazell from Pierce College Early Childhood Education department is going to come and give a presentation on childhood brain development. It's going to be really interesting and informative, so I hope everyone can make it!

I wish you all a very happy and fulfilling February - and I hope each of you takes the time to think about all the people - and the ways - that you love in your life, and enjoy them this time of year!

Jill R. - President

Child Identity Cards Service Project

We were at the South Hill Library for a few hours today holding a service project that teamed up with the King County Police Union Public Safety Employees Local #519 to create free ID Cards for Kids! They were accepting donations but the service was free and they also had coloring books for the kids as well.

Families were encouraged to bring their children of all ages down to the library, each child's picture was taken and turned into a laminated card with important information and their thumb print. Our members provided refreshments and we wound up creating over 100 ID cards!

You can get more information about these ID cards at My ID Club.