St. Elmo News

ANNOUNCEMENTS
Thursday, April 10
• The Fayette County Home and Community Education Get-Acquainted Day: registration 9 a.m., potluck brunch 9:30 a.m. A program will be given by The Scarf Lady. HCE members are reminded to take a Make It, Bake, Sew It or Grow It item for the auction. Each unit is to take a $5 door prize. Guests are welcome.
Because this is the 90th anniversary of IAHCE, those attending the Get-Acquainted Day are urged to wear an apron to carry out the state theme of “Been Cookin’ 90 Years.”
• Lunch Bunch, noon, Mary Ann’s Restaurant.
• The St. Elmo Women’s Civic Club Membership Drive Salad Supper, 5:30 p.m., St. Mary’s Catholic Church Parish Hall. The Apron Lady will give the program.
• The St. Elmo Public Library District Board, 7 p.m., St. Elmo Public Library.
• The Fayette County Extension Foundation, 7 p.m., Vandalia Extension Office.
• The Effingham Chapter #110 Order of the Eastern Star, 7:30 p.m., Effingham Masonic Temple.
Friday, April 11
• Kindergarten pre-registration, 9-10:30 a.m. and 1-2:30 p.m.
• St. Elmo High School “Sound of Music” musical, 8 p.m., in the high school gym. Admission is $5.
Saturday, April 12
• The St. Elmo Community Clothes Closet, 9 a.m.-noon, First United Methodist Church Parsonage.
• Starting at 10 a.m., there will be a benefit trap shoot for Marion Julius of rural Beecher City for medical expenses due to a bear attack on Aug. 11. This is being sponsored by Fayette County Sportsmans Club at Gatch Lake (west of St. Peter, then off the St. Peter-Shobonier blacktop). Lunch available will include pork burgers for $3.50, hot dogs for $2, chips for 75 cents, tea, lemonade and water for $1, and coffee for 50 cents. Gun raffle tickets will be sold for a drawing on Saturday, June 28.
• The St. Elmo High School “Sound of Music” musical, 8 p.m., high school gym. Admission is $5.
Sunday, April 13
• Palm Sunday
• Wolf Creek Cluster of United Methodist Churches Lenten Service, 4 p.m., Asbury United Methodist Church, east and south of Altamont at 500 E, 500 N, Mason.
Monday, April 14
• Fayette County School art students who want to participate in the Fayette County Museum Art Show are to have their entries into the museum by 5:30 p.m.
• American Red Cross blood drive, 3-7 p.m. in the St. Elmo Elementary School. Any student that recruits a donor will receive a Red Cross incentive item.
“The #1 reason people say they don’t give blood is because no one ever asked them. Consider yourself asked. Blood donations saved my life.” This is a quote by Angela on the American Red Cross card announcing the drive.
It is so important that generous donors give regularly so blood products of all types are available whenever and wherever they’re needed. Those able to donate are encouraged to invite a friend or family member to join them in giving blood to help save lives. The need is constant, the gratification is instant – give blood.
To give one should maintain a healthy iron level in the diet by eating iron rich foods such as spinach, red meat, fish, poultry, beans, iron-fortified cereals and raisins.
• St. Elmo Lions Club 6 p.m., Mary Ann’s Restaurant.
Tuesday, April 15
• First day of the two-day defensive driving course, 8 a.m.-noon, St. Elmo Christian Church.
• Flowers need to be removed from the Spring Hill Cemetery gravesites by Tuesday.
Wednesday, April 16
• Reverb Youth, 6 p.m., St. Elmo Christian Church.
• Kids’ Klub, 7-8 p.m., First Church of God S.H.E.D.
Thursday, April 17
• Vit-Em-In Sunday school class potluck, 5:30 p.m., First United Methodist Church Fellowship Hall.
• Maundy Thursday service, 7 p.m., First United Methodist Church.
Community Clothes Closet Gives Back to Community
The St. Elmo Community Clothes Closet started in 2013. The racks are filled with quality clothes for the entire family. All items are donated and the Clothes Closet is manned by a large number of volunteers from the St. Elmo Community.
The volunteers sort by season, gender, age and style. Currently all spring and summer items are featured for newborn to adults – there are a number of nice formals on display for proms and other events.
All the sale proceeds go back into the community. Even though all the clothes (good, clean and some with tags on them) are priced very low, the Clothes Closet was able to disburse $1,600 from the 2013 sales to the St. Elmo Food Pantry, Ministerial Alliance, CAPS (Community Action Partnership Service), Summer Lunches, Avena Park Board District and Lions Club Caring and Sharing program.
The Clothes Closet is open from 9 a.m.-noon on Saturdays and is open to everyone in all the surrounding areas.
The Community Clothes Closet is located at 215 N. Walnut in St. Elmo, in the church parsonage just south of First United Methodist Church.
Friendly Neighbors
Twelve attended the Friendly Neighbors potluck held at noon April 1 at the Phillips Building. They were Marybelle Ledbetter of Brownstown; Cora Miley of Beecher City; and Malinda Miller, Shasa Curry and son, Bob and Joanne Owen, Rosemary Owen, Irene Reed, Marjorie Sarver, and R. W. and Mary Smith, all of St. Elmo.
R. W. Smith led in the pledge of allegiance, and Bob Owen gave the meal blessing.
Five generations were present: Ledbetter is an aunt to Miley, who is Miller’s mother, Curry’s grandmother and Curry’s son’s great-grandmother.
Humorous readings were read by Rosemary Owen and Miley, who also read one given to her by Ledbetter.
CCW
Ann Rowland opened the meeting of the Council of Catholic Women held April 1 in St. Mary’s Catholic Church Parish Hall with prayer.
Roll call was answered with “Did you get April Fooled today?” In addition to Rowland, those present were Karen Denning, Mona Durbin, Lucille Koeberlein, Lavonne Kramer, Mary Myers, Pat Porter and Carol Rine
Thank you notes read included one from the Brownstown junior and senior classes for the donation to the post-prom.
A donation was made to the Effingham Deanery Water for Life that provides clean, safe water to provide food production, good health and improve lives.
Hostess Koeberlein served cake, salami, cheese, crackers, nuts, candy, coffee and sodas.
The annual mother/daughter banquet will be held at the Tuesday, May 6, meeting, which will start at 6:30 p.m. in St. Mary’s Catholic Church Parish Hall. All women of the parish are asked to invite a friend to attend to attend with them.
Wright’s Corner HCE
Chairman Carol Austin opened the Wright’s Corner Home and Community Education meeting held the afternoon of April 2 at the Loudon Town House, with all giving the pledge of allegiance.
Roll call was answered with “What do you do to ‘Keep America Beautiful?’” by Ina Abendroth, Janice Garrison, Kate Jennings, Irene Reed, Mary Smith, Shirley Smith and Una Tish.
The business included reading the March HCE Board notes.
Austin gave the major lesson “Preparing for a Nursing Home Visit.”
The group then filled 55 Easter “rabbit” bags with candy for the Aperion Care nursing home—some of the bags were for diabetics.
Rhodes-Side Gleanings
I try to go to Chicago in March because my daughter and one of my granddaughters have March birthdays. The first three weeks were too busy for me to go and I thought maybe I could go in the fourth week, but I found it was the school’s spring vacation week and my older granddaughter was to be in California.
Soo Jin Lea, a sophomore at the Libertyville High School, was one of 45 band students (the four high school bands have 160 students) who chose to go to California and present a concert band performance. She plays a flute. They were performing during the earthquake.
They left on March 24 and arrived at the Los Angeles Airport. After checking in at the hotel at Garden Grove, they departed for Santa Monica Beach. The next day they went to Disneyland Fantasyland and Tomorrowland. They got to view “Mickey’s Soundsational Sound Parade” and also saw “Fantasmic,” the musical extravaganza. The next day was spent on Catalina Island and at Long Beach.
The Libertyville High School and participated in a soundtrack session workshop Thursday morning. The students stepped into an actual sound studio and took part in a simulated film recording session, complete with video playback and click track. A Disneyland Resort musical director conducted the session, treating the students as if they were professional studio musicians who sight-read and bring life to the score for Disney animation segments.
The rest of the day was enjoyed at Disney’s California Adventure. Soo Jin was one of those who went on the California Screamin’, is a steel roller coaster, cleverly designed as a wooden thrill ride of old.
That evening the Libertyville concert band performed. They played “Phantom of the Opera” and “Fall River Overture.” The California earthquake was when they were playing, but it didn’t stop them.
The last full day in California they went to the Sony Studios (formerly MGM Studios), went to the Egyptian Theater, had a guided tour of Hollywood, went to the Grammy Museum, etc. That evening they enjoyed Dutoit & Thibaudet at the Walt Disney Concert Hall.
I did leave on April 1 for Green Oaks, where Prentiss and Phyllis Lea, Soo Jin and Chae Rin live. It was windy traveling, but the weather was nice. The next day, the weather was very nice. My son, Steve Rhodes, and a friend of his, Scott Edmonds, both of Chicago, came. Dinner that evening was to celebrate Chae Rin’s 14th birthday (it was on March 6). Also, April 2 has a special meaning. April 2, 1990, was when Phyllis and Prentiss arrived back home from Korea with baby daughter Soo Jin; her birth date is Aug. 20, so she was only about 6½ months old.
I came back home on Thursday, April 3. I left Phyllis’ at 8:30 a.m. and it was raining. Right after I left, it was pouring down so hard that the windshield wipers had to go as fast as they could and I had to keep the car windows from inside fogging. When I leave Green Oaks, I have about an hour on I-294, but it was a much longer time with the rain.
I mostly stay in the next to the left lane;I should have moved to the right lanes. When I leave Phyllis’, I get on I-94 that, in just a few miles, is an exit to I-294. With the rain, I didn’t see the exit and was on East I-94. I think I should have stayed on it until I could have exited at I-57 from it.
I went several miles to turn back on West I-94, but I never saw an exit to I-294, so ended back at Bradley, where I exit for Green Oaks. So, I turned back on I-94, stayed in the right lanes and finally got on I-294.
When I left on Tuesday, I kept up with traffic I-294. On Thursday, traffic was much slower, sometimes only 50-55 miles per hour, so it took me much longer to get to I-57.
When I did get on I-57, the heavy rains quit. Off and on, I had rains most of the way and occasionally heavy rains again.
I always stop in Peotone to get gas before going on into Chicago and back on the way home. It was about 10:45 a.m. and I was supposed to be in Champaign at 11:30 a.m. to have lunch at the Olive Gardens with Carol Foeschi. We became friends at the Illinois Association of Home and Community Education Annual Conference a couple of years ago; we are both county HCE second vice presidents, she of Champaign and me of Fayette County.
I knew she had a meeting at 1:30 p.m. so I called her to cancel our lunch meeting because I knew it would be around 12:15-12:30 p.m. before I could get there, and lunch isn’t always served fast.
I didn’t stop for food, just wanted to get back home. When I opened my mail I had the postcard I had sent to Antiques Roadshow to see if I could get an invitation to the one in Chicago this summer. The Champaign post office where our mail has to be sent didn’t send it to the Antique Roadshow address, but to my address that I had to have to have on the back of the postcard. The post office bar code was on the back, but the stamp was on the front of the card, not the back! I took the card to the St. Elmo Post Office for it to be sent as it should have been. Antiques Roadshow may not get it by the April 7 deadline.