Mark your calendar for Golden Goose Fashion Show
Nan Nasser
Jack Davis escorts Willie Reich in a sequined top.
Summer is the time to start marking your fall calendar with dates of fun fall festivities. One of those will be the annual Golden Goose Thrift Shop Fashion Show to be held on Monday, September 8 as part of SaddleBrooke Community Outreach general membership program. The time of the event is 3:00 p.m. in the MountainView Clubhouse Ballroom.
At the moment this is being called Frugal Fashions. Betsy Lawry will coordinate the models and the outfits with something for everyone.
This is a good time to learn more about Community Outreach and its programs for kids. We operate Kids’ Closet, Teen Closet, provide educational opportunities in the form of enrichment programs, tutoring and college scholarships and we support the Tri Community Food Bank with monetary donations and an annual community food drive.
Enjoy the fun, learn about the kids in neighboring communities and prepare to find a bargain in the clothing offered by GGTS.
Annual Walkathon set for October 25
Nan Nasser
We encourage you to save the date for the 18th annual SaddleBrooke Community Outreach Walkathon scheduled for Saturday, October 25, beginning with warm ups at 8:00 a.m. in the SaddleBrooke Clubhouse parking lot.
Following a brisk walk around Ridgeview Boulevard, participants will enjoy a breakfast buffet at the clubhouse. Pets are welcome on the walk but remain outside the building during breakfast.
The tee shirt is being designed, the breakfast menu is being established and sponsors are being solicited. The actual cost of the event will be determined during the summer and registration will begin in September.
Did you know that kids run faster in new sneakers? The proceeds from the Walkathon help to support all of our programs, including Kids’ Closet which provides a new pair of sneakers for each of our clients. Help our kids run faster! Join the Walkathon.
Bashas’ community support card helps the kids
Nan Nasser
Bashas’ has become the local food market for SaddleBrooke and Community Outreach members. They offer a community support card that gives back to SBCO 6% of any purchase on that card and for this financial period SBCO has received almost $4,000 from them.
How does it work? You purchase the card from SBCO for $5 and it comes with $5 on it. Our office is located in the Minit Mart on SaddleBrooke Boulevard and is open Monday through Wednesday from 9:00 a.m. until 3:00 p.m. Then you head to Bashas’ where you can add any amount you wish to that card, typically with a credit card. Shop, pay with the support card, and you have just donated 6% of that purchase to our kids. You do not have to replace the card but can always add additional amounts to it.
This card is also redeemable at AJ’s, Food City, Eddie’s Country Store in Pinetop and the Dine’ stores on Indian reservations. Spending the summer in the White Mountains? Pick up and use the card at Eddie’s. Love AJ’s salads and treats? Use the card at La Encantada. Help us help our kids toward a better lifestyle.
Oro Valley Hardware store helps Kids’ Closet
Mary Kay Stein
The Zoo Room at the SaddleBrooke Community Outreach’s Kids’ Closet in Mammoth is a favorite stop for visitors of all ages. The Zoo Room, the room that holds bins of clothing and shoes, got its name from the colorful drawings of animals that line the walls all around the room. A group of SaddleBrooke artists painted the colorful animal figures.
But the Zoo Room had a problem. As Kids’ Closet co-Vice President Paula Morgan explained, the Kids’ Closet crew realized the bins currently in use were being discontinued and replaced with a bin size that would not work with the current shelving units which were handmade by Home Depot volunteers. A new plan to buy and store two seasons of clothing also meant that 800, not 400 bins, would be needed. The older style bins were being phased out by the plastics company. What to do; the Closet couldn’t change the shelving, but how could they find enough bins in the old size?
The owners of the Ace Hardware store at Tangerine and First in Oro Valley came to the rescue. Paula credits Karen Doolittle, former co-director of Kids’ Closet, for spearheading the project all the way to the ultimate delivery of the bins to the Closet. First, Karen contacted Anne and John Picolli and their son Justin, owners of the Ace Hardware at First and Tangerine Roads in Oro Valley, to ask for their help. Paula noted that the Picolli family has helped Kids’ Closet before, often selling supplies for the Closet at close to cost rather than regular retail prices. When Karen Doolittle contacted the Picolli’s the family went into action to solve the problem.
Justin did a nationwide search to see who might still have the older style bins and then worked out a plan to have the bins delivered to their store in the most economical way possible. Remember that this is 800 bins, complete with packing materials. John Picolli and employee Chris McMeekin unpacked the shipments, recycled all the extra cardboard and packing materials and carefully stacked the bins into the Kids’ Closet van for transport. The Closet was able to transport the bins in only a few trips. In Mammoth the bins were easy to unload and quickly put into service.
On April 25, SaddleBrooke Community Outreach President Maggie DeBrock and Paula Morgan presented a special plaque to the Piccoli’s as SBCO Sponsors of the Year. The Picolli’s have owned their store for the past six years.
Recycling notice
Nan Nasser
SaddleBrooke residents have banded together to support recycling used products, either through Waste Management pickups or even donating to the Golden Goose Thrift Shop.
There is one more recycling effort that will benefit our kids affiliated with SaddleBrooke Community Outreach and that is the specific recycling of aluminum cans.
When SBCO was in its infancy in 1997 we began to collect aluminum cans. Unit people would receive the cans at their homes, drive them to the Semester’s and a recycling company would come out to collect them.
SaddleBrooke began to grow and someone’s front patio was not the ideal spot to collect mountains of black garbage bags. Tucson Aluminum Recycling stepped in and provided a dumpster and it is still in operation at the Pickleball parking lot off of Ridgeview Boulevard. You will see it on the left of front parking lot with a sign on it.
Since the inception of the program SBCO has received over $45,000 from this recycling effort. For years we have been able to provide a seasonal school wardrobe consisting of three outfits at an average cost of under $75. That is 600 wardrobes that have helped 600 youngsters attend school on a regular basis!
Find a spot in your garage to deposit aluminum drinking cans. Take them to the dumpster at your convenience (there is a small step up to the dumpster) and help a youngster go to school.
More information about SBCO can be found at www.community-outreach.org.