Kari Barnes along with her fellow leader Kitty Young thought they were just going to be dropping their girls off at meetings when they first got involved in the program. However, the need for volunteers and the desire to keep the girls involved in an activity that has the ability to help parents produce strong confident young women has motivated them for the last six years.

The Girl Scout movement is presently realigning its goals and structure to keep their members involved through high school and to incorporate technology and forward thinking ideals into the current program. Kari spoke about their fund raising effort (Girl Scout cookies anyone--see Kari) which will help augment the costs of a three day trip to the Boundary Waters. The troop also has taken on a project that will earn them a Bronze Medal. They will be constructing a butterfly garden at the Northland Arboretum. They hope to continue on through the Silver and Gold levels so that by the time the girls are seniors they will be eligible for the many scholarships offered through the program.

Kari thanked the area leader as well as Laura Beilke and the United Way for their continued support of this outstanding program for young women. The girls gave a demonstration of how they begin and end their meetings and a question and answer session followed Kari's presentation.

His outstanding participation in Sertoma earned him recognition last year as one of the top three Sertomans in the nation. He was part of the group that originated the gossamer ceiling and organized those setups until the Rookies took over this year. He was instrumental in starting the new Bemidji Club and lines up all those great speaker just to mention a few of the things Joe does with this club.

It was a humbling experience to be presented to the club along with George Moore as a role model for Joe. Joe has worked for Kelly Services for the past nine years and is District Manager with offices in Brainerd and Bemidji. Kelly Services has 2700 branches in 24 countries and has just expanded into Japan. They provide quality staffing with 32 different programs offered to fit all needs.

 Joe is married to his wife Melody and has been "since the Bee Gees had the number one song and dance floors were lit". Their daughter is attending medical college and working on her master's. He collects and restores old cars and enjoys sailing. He met and married Melody because he was throwing beer cans at her at a softball tournament. Compliments to Joe for his edited version of this embarrassing event due to our "young visitors"

Taylor Fitterer was very quick to acknowledge what a huge impact our flags had on the Extravaganza. Taylor, in his capacity as Chairman of the event remarked, "With everything going on, not only in community but throughout our country and overseas, the flags brought the Extravaganza much closer and unified our event more that we thought possible. I cannot tell you the number of compliments we received not only on the ice, but also through letters and e-mails."

• Steve Mau has a JoAnn LoAnn thing going with the Culligan lady.
• YNot Cancun is Charlie Bartel's motto--have fun on your vacation the next few weeks.
• Welcome back Amie Anderson, Amy Doyle and Gary Phillips.
• Dave Clausen paid to be a Dog Pound Wannabee today but he claims he had lots of fun.
• Tami Webb told us the story of the hot pajamas (shopping in Cub) which were actually "driving pants" because she drove home from a convention in Mankato in them also. That lead up to her speech to encourage us all to attend the Regional Convention in St. Cloud in May. She emphasized the chances we would have to vote for Regional Director, develop leadership skills, network, learn about fund raising and follow Hopper's motto to work hard and play hard.
• A special thanks again from the newsletter editor to Joe Schulte for the great compliment

Kari Barnes and her assistant Cathy Picek are the go-to folks for Pipe and Drape information.

Need awards? Did you lose your pin? Tami Webb (tamiwebb61@yahoo.com) is the person in charge of awards and meeting paraphernalia.