Take and Eat Meals Ministry - Berkshire County and Pioneer Valley (Greenfield/Turners Falls - Chicopee - Ludlow - Easthampton - Holyoke - Hadley/N. Hadley - S. Hadley/Granby)

TAKE AND EAT, INC  PEOPLE FEEDING PEOPLE"

A Blessed Thanksgiving to each of the Coordinators and all of your Team Ministry Members at The Weekend Meals Ministry sites throughout Berkshire County and the Pioneer Valley!  Deacon Frank and I, along with all of the over 1,700 clients and their caregivers and family members, count each of you as a special blessing in our lives.  You are individually and collectively truly demonstrating "putting shoes on the Gospel message" through your beautiful works of charity in this ministry to our homebound seniors…you have touched many, many lives in multiple ways – spiritually and physically…you epitomize Blessed Teresa's message of "do small things with great love"…thank you and God Bless you and your family…

I am attaching the 2010 Calendar for each of your sites.  Essentially, I have mirrored what you committed to when your team entered this ministry. In those instances where your scheduled weekend falls on a 3 day holiday weekend that is identified on the spreadsheet.

I am requesting the Coordinators review this schedule and book those dates with your kitchen and advise appropriate Parish staff/committees.  Should it be necessary to do a schedule change due to a conflict, please let me know ASAP.  As you can appreciate, once this information is shared with the various Elder Services agencies, clients and posted on the web site (www.takeandeat.org), those dates are "in stone".  We wish to finalize this calendar by December 10, 2009 so please let me know prior to that date if you have any questions, etc.

Once again, thank you and may the coming year be a blessed, peace-filled and bountiful year ahead…and we ask you to please keep the Take and Eat Program, all of its clients and volunteers in your prayers as we go forward maintaining and  expanding this Ministry during this New Year…in closing, we offer the following prayer for you on this Day of Thanksgiving…Blessings, Kathleen and Deacon Frank

 

Thank you for the blessings that you give to us each day; For friends and family we hold dear, for all you send our way. We ask that you will guide us well, in everything we do, And pray we never will forget these blessings came from you. Amen.

From Susan Newton of S. Hadley, a Food For Friends volunteer - See below or click HERE

From: Susan Newton
Date: Wed, Nov 25, 2009 at 9:51 AM
Subject: Obama Administration Calls on Americans to Help Fight Hunger
To: Bob Judge <BobJudge@comcast.net>

Hi Bob, I thought you mind find this link of interest and possible use on the "Food for Friends" blog:  http://philanthropy.com/news/updates/index.php?id=10256.  I'm assuming it's fully accessible, but let me know if not.
-----------------------------------------------
Susan Newton
Associate Director for Research
Center for Public Policy and Administration
University of Massachusetts Amherst
404 Thompson Hall
Amherst, MA  01003
http://www.masspolicy.org

From the Easthampton Council on Aging

ANNOUNCING TAKE AND EAT, INC.:  Highland Valley Elder Services and Take and Eat, Inc. are pleased to inform you that volunteers from the Immaculate Conception Church in Easthampton will be preparing and delivering free, hot, nutritious meals to homebound seniors in Easthampton.  These meals will be prepared and delivered the 4th Saturday of each month and will consist of one meal for Saturday and one meal for Sunday.   Meals will be delivered between 11:30 a.m. and 12:30 p.m.  If you are interested in receiving these Saturday home delivered meals from Immaculate Conception, please contact the Enrichment Center for the necessary paperwork or call Kathleen Ryan of the Take and Eat Program at 413-664-1041.

Criminal Offender Record Information (CORI) Request Form - Click below or here

From Joseph R. Nadeau - Coordinator for St. Theresa's People Feeding People

Congratulation!!
You people are doing a great job!!!!
Now wasn't that 1st response to your meal great?
Did you get that warm fuzzy feeling in your heart?
Keep up the good work and may God Bless all your efforts.

Joseph R. Nadeau
Coordinator for St. Theresa's People Feeding People

From: "Charlotte Buijnarowski"
To: "Charlotte Buijnarowski" ...
Subject: Confirming November 14 as next meal prep

Hello Food For Friends Volunteers,

Just a double-confirmation that the next meal prep will be November 14th.  I was alerted that some church bulletins/newsletters still had November 21, so I wanted to clear up any confusion.

Also, to confirm why we are doing this, I want to share a comment I received back from one of our meal recipients.  She says:
"What a nice surprise.  Thank you ever so much.  The meal was delicious and greatly appreciated.  Thanks again."

These thanks go to all the volunteers who made that meal for her possible!

Best,
Charlotte

RE: New Clients

From: "take and eat"
To: "Charlotte' 'Buijnarowski" "BobJudge"
Cc: "Charlotte Buijnarowski"
Sent: Thursday, October 29, 2009 12:54:50 PM GMT -05:00 US/Canada Eastern
Subject: RE: 3 New Clients  (Please note PS

Charlotte and Bob,

Thanks – in terms of any referrals that you provide to me, yes I will also contact WMEC.

Kathleen

From Charlotte Buijnarowski, Charlotte
Sent: Wednesday, October 28, 2009 4:48 PM
To: BobJudge
Cc: Charlotte Buijnarowski; take and eat
Subject: RE: 3 New Clients (Please note PS

Hi Bob,

This item would be a good one for our debrief agenda...

My feeling is that we should not go too fast-forward right now on adding additional names to our list.  Unless there is a strong personal connection to someone who is in great need of a meal and not is on the list, I think we should first get acclimated to the "standard process" for another couple of months.  How does that sound to you?  Am I being too cautious?

If client names are to be kept confidential, I think the process might be:

1.  Any person can recommend a name (with contact information).
2.  We can check the client list to see if that person is on the list or not.
3.  If not, we can send to Kathleen, who will add to the South Hadley / Granby list.  Will she also contact WMEC?
4.  Once the name has been confirmed or added, we can get back to the person who gave us the recommendation to let them know that the person(s) will be receiving a weekend meal.
5.  In all communications about client names, stress that client information is strictly confidential.

Charlotte