Archive for "Community"
Rotary Luncheons are Back
Posted on June 23, 2021 by Ching under Community.
It’s so great to have our in-person Rotary meetings again. The past year has been a real challenge. It was difficult to engage club members without meeting on a regular basis. I hope with regular programming, everyone will start coming back.
Last week we had a great presentation from Jenny Shipman with the Alzheimer’s Association. She shared information about the diseases and helpful tips on how we can reduce our risk. While no one is immune from aging, there are several things we can do now like exercising, eating well, being social, and stimulating our minds by learning new things and doing brain puzzles.
We have several great speakers visiting our club over the next couple of months. I’m hoping that we will start to see our members at the meetings again. Here’s to a great Rotary year.
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Wichita Pickleball Now Has an Official Website
Posted on May 3, 2021 by Ching under Community, Hobbies.
Meet Bill Mitchell. The man who inspired the new ictpickleball.com website.
I met Bill while checking out McAdams Recreation Center a couple of weeks ago. As with all the new people I meet, I encouraged him to join the Wichita Pickleball Facebook group to connect with other pickleball players in the area. There’s only one problem. He doesn’t have a Facebook account. This isn’t the first time I’ve heard this response. A lot of people these days are not Facebook. It got me thinking, how do we reach people who, like Bill Mitchell, are not on Facebook?
I came to one logical conclusion: we needed a website. And so ictpickleball.com was born. I had a couple of hours to spare and unused hosting space on brubakers.us so I made a simple website using WordPress. I purchased the ictpickleball.com domain from Go Daddy for less than $20 and then just forwarded the domain to the new WordPress site on my existing host.
Along with this, I also started an email list for those who want to stay informed. So now people who do not have Facebook accounts will have a way to keep up with what’s happening in our pickleball community without having to become part of the Wichita Pickleball Facebook group.
I don’t know why it took me a couple of years to do this. I think mostly I was too busy before and only recently had time to really think about things. Anyway, it’s live now and I hope that people find it useful.
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Vaccine Awareness Initiative
Posted on April 28, 2021 by Ching under Community, Projects.
Assistant District Governor Arlen Honts visited the Rotary Club of Andover last week and talked to us about the #RotarySharingSmiles project. Rotarian DeAnn Sullivan came up with the idea when she saw a yard display on her way to her sister’s house one day. She came up with the idea for Rotary to make our own signs to brighten other people’s day while also promoting vaccine awareness.
Here are some pictures that I took at the Rotary luncheon last week.
It was our first in person Rotary meeting in a long time. There were only eight of us who attended but it was nice to see everyone there. Our club has really struggled with virtual meetings so I’m hoping that things will begin to return to normal and we can start in person meetings again.
I’m grateful for Arlen visiting our club and talking to us about this initiative. Kudos to DeAnn for coming up with such a great idea!
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It’s a Big Dill 2021
Posted on April 23, 2021 by Ching under Community, Events.
I had the opportunity to help with the Wichita Children’s Home It’s a Big Dill! pickleball tournament this past weekend. The event was fantastic and the organizers did a fabulous job. Here are a few pictures.
The event was a huge success and, even though I didn’t get to play this year, I am so glad I got to be part of it. I need to make sure I’m free on the weekend of the event because I definitely want to play in it next year. Until next time. GNG.
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Tournaments are Back
Posted on April 22, 2021 by Ching under Community, Events, Family, Hobbies.
After a year of no events or gatherings of any kind, tournaments are finally back. It seems like there’s pickleball tournament every weekend this month at Chicken N Pickle. There were even two back to back last weekend, one on Saturday and one Sunday. Now that people are getting vaccinated, it seems everyone is getting more comfortable with being out and around other people.
Creating Tomorrows hosted a pickleball tournament at Chicken N Pickle a couple of weeks ago which I attended as a spectator because I didn’t know about it until last minute. We were at dinner at Carrabba’s and Joe just happened to mention that he had donated several prizes to this tournament. I normally play pickleball at noon at Nahola but made an exception because I wanted to support a cause that’s meaningful to my friend Joe.
I didn’t get to play but I got to do the next best thing — write the bracket on the whiteboard. I love when Michael let’s me do it.
Anyway, here are a couple of pictures of the tournament champs Mason McCanless and Caesar Naftzger who played as Big Caesar’s Pizza.
After the tournament, I went home to get Brian and we both drove to the outdoor courts at Mulvane to surprise dad. We gave him a card and some gift cards for his birthday, which he always tries to keep on the DL.
It was a beautiful day for a drive and we had a nice visit with mom and dad and the entire Cannady clan who were all there playing with them. We didn’t get to play with them that time but I’m hoping we have more nice weather ahead and will have another opportunity to play pickleball with the family very soon.
Until next time. GNG.
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