October with CARE

Hello everyone, October has been a very long month, and I know that everyone is excited for halloween, myself included. I have done a couple things with CARE this month including volunteering a couple of times and participating in a fundraiser for CARE at Campbell United Methodist Church.

When I volunteer at CARE, I mostly walk dogs and chat with visitors to the adoption center. If I have extra time I also play with the cats and make sure all the animals have water and food. I go for two hour periods on Fridays from 1-3. It's a really enjoyable experience and I look forward to my volunteer shifts. I love walking in and seeing that a dog or cat that has been there for a couple months waiting for a home has finally been adopted, it definitely makes all the hard work that goes into this no kill shelter worth it.

Sarah and I went to a fundraiser for CARE at the Methodist church I mentioned above. They are located on east republic st. They were holding a "pet blessing" day, where the members of the congregation could bring their beloved pets to be blessed with good health for a year. There was quite a variety of pets present. There were tiny dogs to large grey hounds, a police dog named Raider, a small boy with his pet goat (so cute, the goat was tiny and he was walking it on a leash :)) and a lady with a pet skunk she was carrying around in her purse. We took a dog from CARE named barney, he was very well behaved for the most part, but wanted to play with all the dogs, including the larger ones who weren't so keen on being bothered by him. We took donations for CARE and gave out some litereature about them. The whole event took about two hours, and I would say it was a success.

I didn't really discuss why I chose summit, and why I wanted to work with CARE in my previous post. I chose summit because it would fulfill some of my requirements for the leadership program at Drury, and it seemed like a really good oppurtunity to get out in the community that I grew up in and offer some help. I was unsure about who I would be living with, but my roommates kind of fell into my lap one night at a mutual friend's house. We were all talking about how stressed we were trying to find roommates, when someone pointed out that we could all just live together. Thus, our summit group was created. I now live with three of my best friends, and they are making my sophmore year of college the best yet :)

We chose CARE because it is less known and smaller than many organizations in Springfield. They are also the only no-kill animal shelter in the area. I really love animals, probably more than people sometimes, so I knew that I wanted to help out in some way. They were very glad to recieve our help, and this year is going smoothly. Ive been in contact with Yoko Williams (the volunteer coordinator) and Kiersten Bagley (The new PR person for CARE) all year and we have been able to raise some money for CARE already.

So what's next for CARE? The calanders are FINALLY ready, so we will be collecting those and selling them for CARE. We are also making ribbons for animal welfare awareness. We will be selling both of those around campus and artwalk during November, so watch for those. All proceeds will go to CARE.

-Anna