School Performances

We’re lucky to have a few schools close to the club.  During the fall, we attended two performances at one of our local elementary schools.  The first was a musical performance based on Lewis and Clark.  Many of our members had key parts in the performance.  When the show ended, we gave each of our members a flower for doing such a great job!

We also attended a holiday orchestra performance.  Many of our members participate in a strings orchestra, which consists of cellos and violins, while others participate in a separate orchestra which includes many other instruments. 

Here is one of our members performing a saxophone solo:

And coming soon, a post about Bristol Elementary's Circus performance!

Goofy Golf

We recently put together a day of “Goofy Golf” for our members.  We turned our learning center, art room, and gym into a miniature golf course, but instead of the normal putter and golf ball, we made things a little goofier!

Some holes used hockey sticks and hockey pucks, others used a baseball bat and a baseball,
while some had scooters to sit on and funny garments to wear. 

Our last hole was the goofiest of them all: members had to use a hockey stick to hit a plastic bowling ball into 10 pins (in the hopes of knocking them all down, of course!). 

We split the members into groups of four, and each group had a designated score keeper (we created some pretty silly scorecards for them). 

We’ll definitely be doing this again!

Welcome to Foodopolis

One of the latest additions to our club is Foodopolis.  This is part of the club where our members eat snacks, drink juice, and enjoy sitting amongst friends at our large tables.   We had members color pictures of their favorite fruits and veggies, then we hung them from the ceiling as a colorful reminder of healthy eating habits.  And yes, those are indeed crazy straw hanging from the ceiling as well!

BOARD GAME MANIA!

In honor of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, we turned our whole gym into a GIANT board game. 

We used pieces of colorful paper to cut out squares.  The squares formed a path from one end of the gym to the next. We wrote special commands on some of the squares: “roll again”, “lose a turn”, “move two spaces forward”, etc.  Poster sheets were used to create huge trivia and activity cards, while a cardboard box was covered in construction paper to look like dice. 

Kids were used as the “pieces” and placed in teams to walk on the "board." 

The trivia cards incorporated questions about Martin Luther King Jr. and African American History. 

The activity cards consisted of challenges that incorporated teamwork, for instance:  keeping a bunch of balloons in the air for a minute;

challenging a staff member to jump rope contest (that's me!);  

or getting every single person on your team to score a basket with a football in under a minute.

Here is the winning team!

Christmas Events

The fall holiday season may have ended a month ago, but really, who doesn’t like to talk about holidays???  During the month of December, we had a few special days planned for our members.  One day included decorating sugar cookies, and another focused on making ornaments out of popsicle sticks. 

But the star of our holiday season was our Pajama Jam Party!  Our members stayed at our club after the normal hours because we had a spectacular night planned for them (while their parents got to have a few extra hours to themselves).  

We started out the night with a Pickle Hunt. Yes, I said PICKLE HUNT!  We taught our kids about the German tradition of the Christmas pickle: each year, a family hid a pickle somewhere on the tree, and the first kid to find it Christmas morning received an extra gift. This German tradition inspired our Pickle Hunt.  We hid one pickle somewhere throughout the whole building, then split the kids into teams of five. The first team to find the pickle received a prize!  But the catch was, they had to stay with their team throughout the whole search (no splitting up)! 

Explanation of Pickle Hunt:

Pickle Hunt Madness:

After the Pickle Hunt, we decorated gingerbread houses made of graham crackers:

While others enjoyed playing a game of hockey in the gym or one of our favorite games, Baby Food Roulette.   Baby Food Roulette incorporates, wait for it… BABY FOOD! It’s a game that is much like hot potato.  Members stand in a circle.  One member starts out with a plastic spoon.  When the music starts, the spoon is passed around the circle.  When the music stops, whoever is holding the plastic spoon, must blindly pick a jar of baby food from a bag, take a bite, and then they’re out! We played this game back in October as well, and it was a HUGE hit with the kids, so we had to be bring it back. Who knew baby food could be so tasty???

We also had some delicious pizza and chocolaty chocolate milk for dindin.  Yummy!

J Aren’t holidays the best? J

By the way...

Let me introduce myself:

Hi! My name is Kelly.  I’m a staff member at El Pomar, but I also help out at the Tutt Club from time to time (specifically with the Teen Safe Driving Program on Wednesdays).  You can also find my name on the right side of this blog under the “Meet the Staff” section. 

See, this is me all happy shmappy:

Oh, and this is me eating a piece of celery:

(As part of our Triple Play program, the kids had to guess what fruit or vegetable they tasted while they were blindfolded.  As you can see, I took a turn, and wasn’t very happy with what I got ;)

I have been working with the Boys and Girls Club of the Pikes Peak Region since September of 2010.  Many of you may not know this, but I was brought here through Americorps.  Americorps hires volunteers and places them in special places and positions throughout the United States. I came all the way from Virginia, right outside of Washington D.C.  And you better believe I’ve loved every minute of being here with you all!

Before working with the Boys and Girls Club, I had a few fun internships: with the PBS KIDS website, as well as the AOL Kids website (with their online radio show!).  I also worked for an online Green Wedding Magazine.  By now you’re probably noticing an “online” pattern of sorts, which is why I’m so passionate about getting this blog up and running at the Boys and Girls Club.  I also had a bit of time working for an International Development Firm back in D.C., as well as a few years as a Substitute Teacher.  Fun stuff, right?

As we all get to know each other on a new level through this blog, please feel free to interact.  My email address is listed in the blog profile, and there is indeed a comments section at the end of each blog post in order for you to leave feedback.  Digital high-fives are always welcome!  I am so excited to share with you an inside look at our clubs. 
:) Enjoy (: