News and Notes From Neddy:

Wow! What can I say about July? It has been quite a whirlwind month with many sites running simultaneously. We sponsor a Summer Eat s Program, which includes Silver Leaf, Fournier Park, Allen Crest, and Riverside Village and several other sites.  Without your welcoming us, it wouldn’t have been possible to accomplish this service. This was truly a community effort. Thank you so much, you have made a difference in the lives of these children during their summer vacation. As you all know this summer program is geared toward feeding healthy breakfasts and lunches to our neighborhood school children, so they don’t go hungry. They also got to be "hands on" in a number of activities with the participation and collaboration of other agencies and organizations such as 4-H Clubs, Expanded Su mmer Math, Food and Nutrition Education Program , and the Cool Cash Program from Fidelity Bank .  Author Grace Birch visited one of our sites with her book: Otto’s Home. She did a fantastic presentation and gave a free cute stuffed dog to each child. We have been fortunate to have all these collaborators supporting our program sites.

T he children participated in recreational activities in their new room, donated by Katie & Peter Bovenz i and volunteers, as well as outdoor activities, like going to the Water Park and local playgrounds, they played soccer, and basketball as well. They enjoyed nature and animals by going to the Lancaster Mentor Farm , and Gove Farm in Leominster. Thank you to Growing Places for helping to secure a site at Allencrest for a Community Garden. They had reading time with Debbie Richard , a good friend of the Center, many thanks Debbie, the Center appreciates your work here. The sites also had veggie and fruit tasting presentations for the children in an effort to enhance good nutrition. 

In addition, we have been very involved in preparing our closure activity for the Summer Eats Program which is our big Block Party. We had our usual contact and shared with other agencies and community leaders as usual. I want to thank the Fitchburg Senior Center for the food donation that we got yesterday. We were also lucky to have Senator Jim McGovern come and visit our sites in three different occasions. On the 29th he stopped by just for coffee and conversation with us. Thank you Senator McGovern, please come again.

I also want to thank Erica Dellovo, youth leader at the Leominster United Methodist Churc h, for having a group of teens come to paint our picnic tables and clean our yard.

As you see it has been a very busy, engaging and successful month at the Center. As I prepare myself to take a summer break, I want to wish all, a very safe and fun rest of the summer. Thank you for your interest and involvement in our common cause of serving others, for a better world.



 Peace, love and joy,

Neddy

Neddy Latimer