On June 11, the Hamilton Area Dystonia Support Group hosted its 21st annual Freedom to MOVE walk and barbeque. We had a wonderful group of 75 people join us for a very warm walk, lunch, prizes, and a few hours of enjoying being together.
There was an awesome crew of volunteers to help this year. Darleen Burnett, Marian Voisin, Paul Gowans, Kayla Louden, Tammy Louden, Roland Gionet, Mike Bell, Charlotte King, Bill Clark, and Mark Cripps, Wendy and Lianna Ramsay. They did everything from kitchen work to ticket sales to cooking and being our MC.
All of our refreshments were donated by Myrtle Gowans, Marlynn Fortino, Nancy Page, Cheryl Dillon, Rose and Roland Gionet and Carol Timmers. Having these donations helped our event total go event higher.
For the first time, this year, we had a volunteer crew from TELUS. David Clarke and his team, Todd and Cindy were a great help with setting up, registration and clearing up the pavilion at the end of the event. I had so much great feed back about these people and their go-to attitudes! Many thanks to Stefanie Ince for bringing the opportunity to find this help to my attention.
Cheryl brought a friend to play his guitar and sing for us during our pre-walk period. Thanks so much to George Appleton for sharing his tunes!
It is impossible to thank every person who brought a prize donation. But congratulations to all the winners! There were 2 winery tours, a beautiful fishing rod and tackle box, a one-hour massage and 2 gift baskets. Plus! Too much more to list here! This year our raffle ticket sales increased noticeably.
Many new folks came with Cheryl Dillon from St. Catharines to help boost our numbers. Cheryl sold 17 of the 24 t-shirts she had made up…. they were a hit! A few more will be available at the September 17 meeting or by contacting Cheryl at the dystoniahamilton@gmail address. Only 7 are left, so hurry!
The weather was windy and very humid. The walk itself was difficult for some, because of the heat. But it did not rain, as expected, and the breezes helped us stay comfortable.
With pledges, refreshments, raffle and door prize ticket sales, our group raised $7,000.00 this year. I am very proud that we were able to increase, substantially, our donations to DMRF Canada over previous years.
We have booked Battlefield Park, Stoney Creek, for our June 10, 2017 event.
Thanks to all of our volunteers, and participants for truly making this a memorable fun event.
