We hope that by participating in the Family Volunteer challenge, you will make some family memories and instill in your children the importance of caring for your community and the people in it!
For six completed activities, your family will have one chance to win a Montgomery Pool Pass. For nine completed activities, your family will get two chances to enter the drawing.
Learn more about the Family Volunteer Challenge at https://www.montgomeryohio.gov/montgomery-family-volunteer-challenge/
We hope that by participating in the Family Volunteer challenge, you will make some family memories and instill in your children the importance of caring for your community and the people in it!
For six completed activities, your family will have one chance to win a Montgomery Pool Pass. For nine completed activities, your family will get two chances to enter the drawing.
Learn more about the Family Volunteer Challenge at https://www.montgomeryohio.gov/montgomery-family-volunteer-challenge/
Thank you for joining us. I'm Amy Frederick joining me is Wendy Grethel, Customer Service and Volunteer Specialist here in the city of Montgomery. Wendy, you and I have been working on this contest. Tell us a little bit about how the contest works.
Wendy Grethel:Families will download a family volunteer challenge checklist we have on the website, or they can come into City Hall to pick one up. And there are 12 activities that the families can do together on the list. Some of them are easy. Some of them are a little bit more time-consuming. But if they complete six of the activities, they get entered into a drawing for a pool pass, and if they complete nine of their activities, they will have two chances to enter into the drawing. We'd like for them to take pictures while they're doing the activities and then to return the checklist that's all filled out along with the pictures. They'll be entered into the raffles.
Amy Frederick:That sounds like a lot of fun for families. So while you tell me a little bit more about these challenges. I saw everything in here that has something for everyone. We have something for the art lover. We have something for people who like activities. Why don't you go through a few of those challenges for us?
Wendy Grethel:Sure. Some of us are just kindness activities for neighbors or anybody that they want to do a random act of kindness to. We have collecting things to donate to either a food pantry or.
Amy Frederick:Other places like Operation Giveback that's taking school supplies, kind of hygiene products we have on there.
Wendy Grethel:Yes. Matthew 25, We have some of those. All of the charitable organizations are close to Montgomery. We felt it was important for families just to take some time to give back to the community. I have been a volunteer specialist here and it is eye-opening to see how much we rely on our volunteers to make Montgomery such a special community.
Amy Frederick:So let's talk about how we came up with this idea. And I have to say, this was something I had thought about. Our city manager and a council member had talked about how to get more families to volunteer. So he kind of challenged me and my supervisor, Matthew, what would that look like? So I spent a couple of months trying to think of somehow to get families to volunteer, but kind of make it fun. And then once I knew we were getting a new customer service and volunteer representative, which obviously is you, Wendy, I knew that your personality and your warm and fuzzy and all of your experience would fit well with the challenges. And so that's how we got started. We just started working for a way to help spread volunteering and kindness in a time of the year when maybe it's cold and you're stuck at home. Some of these challenges don't really require a lot of effort, I don't think. And you might even be able to clean out your closet to boot. I mean, my daughter and I cleaned out our closet that we had four years ago. So that's just one of the challenges just to donate that. So that's what we had planned to do. So looking at these challenges, which one do you think are the hardest ones and which ones do you think you can knock out in a Saturday afternoon?
Wendy Grethel:You know, some of the ones that might be harder or a little more time-consuming would be maybe going to some of the organizations to donate time there. We have some hands-on craft items. There's some no-sew blankets for Linus project. Some people might find that a little more challenging. Then there's easy things like making cards or sidewalk chalk and leaving a cheery note somewhere. And those might be a little bit easier for other things, but I think all ages can participate. I made some dog treats with my granddaughters who are two and three, and that was a family challenge in itself. But we did end up having a good time and got some fun pictures of girls all gooey or doughy in flour.
Amy Frederick:I'll bet. I will say my daughter and I, my daughter is 14, she has been to several events here in Montgomery and helped us sound like the craft table and stuff. So she and I decided to do some of the challenges to see how much time they would take. Obviously, we are not eligible for the pool prize, but we did go through the list and decide to do some of them. I think my favorite so far was doing the cards. We made cards for Meadowbrook and CareCore. Some of them are just simple and sweet and it's fun for mom and Dad to get involved. Kids always love to draw, and that's something that you can knock out on a cold afternoon together. We plan to send those out before Valentine's Day, and then we plan to do the bookmarks. We've already gotten the paper and the artwork that we want to do and just leave them in random books at our library. One we're looking forward to is the blanket. I've never even heard of a no-sew blanket. So that was going to be the most challenging for us. But I looked up and watched videos on how to do it, and I'm pretty confident it should probably only take a Saturday afternoon, but not much time really, and just drop it off here across the street should be easy enough for us to get through. The other one I did was I did shovel someone's driveway on Sunday, which was a little bit more time-consuming than I thought it would be. Also, my body felt a little more tired, but that was easy enough to knock out and it was quite a surprise for that person. So those are probably the easiest ones.
Wendy Grethel:I think it's kind of fun. When we were putting this together, there's the random acts of kindness and to find out that the Random Acts of Kindness week is in February. So I thought that that was kind of a fun way to fit that in. And there are links and suggestions and instructions for some of the activities on our website. So hopefully, people could make whatever you know they want, but hopefully, there just will help give people ideas on what they can do.
Amy Frederick:So why do you think contest like this is important?
Wendy Grethel:Number one, just to instill kindness, and what better way to be a good role model for your kids than to volunteer with them? And hopefully, you know, families will learn to volunteer together and maybe make it a habit for themselves and just a love for their community.
Amy Frederick:I always think people are hungry for something and they want to help. I think most people are good people and maybe they can't always think of something or they want to pass along the message of kindness, but they don't really know what that might look like. So I think looking at these challenge cards, I'd never thought about leaving a note in a library. I'd never thought about leaving a Post-it in a store where something could read it. So I think maybe people are hungry for that and they don't really know how to get started. So the challenge cards are just something to help your little ones who are maybe too small to volunteer by themselves to really get a taste of what kindness is and what volunteering and helping their city looks like.
Wendy Grethel:Sure, there's even easy things just to go around and pick up litter. And you can do that with all kinds. But some of the time-consuming activities are just a fun way to make family memories that you can have. I know when I used to volunteer with my boys when they were younger, I always had a picture-perfect idea in my head and we'd all be happy and there was always somebody who was grumbling and whining. But you know what? To accomplish a common goal, I think they always felt good about working together as a family and those were some of the best memories that we have. We still talk about them.
Amy Frederick:I agree. That's a wonderful memory to have with your children. So what do you feel like families can get out of this just togetherness.
Wendy Grethel:Togetherness, pride in their community, getting to know their neighbors. Maybe you don't know your neighbor down the road a little bit and you can bake them some cookies or like you said, shovel their sidewalk.
Amy Frederick:So why don't you tell us a little bit more when the contest ends, the particulars on how many have to do to maybe win that pool pass?
Wendy Grethel:Sure. So you have to complete at least six of the activities. The contest runs from February 1st through the end of March. So they have two months to complete the six activities for one entry or it's nine activities for two raffle entries.
Amy Frederick:So if they have any questions, how can they get a hold of you, Wendy?
Wendy Grethel:They can call the City Hall or they can go online. My email address is w grethel@montgomeryohio.gov. There's ideas and instructions and everything. Downloading the card is all on our website at www.montgomeryohio.gov.
Amy Frederick:That's right. And if you want to call Wendy, if you're more of a talker than a typer, give her a call at 513-891-2424. Thank you for listening.
Wendy Grethel:Great. Thank you.