Lake Forest Park Rotarians and 1000 ears of corn at the Back to School Event

L to R:  Fred Lupton (background), Kathy Martin with the corn
and Wendy Wands adds a hotdog on the bun.
Photo by Marj Ando

By Carol Dahl

A great team from Lake Forest Park Rotary Club volunteered their time and energy on a beautiful Saturday to a Back-to-School community "Service Above Self" event. We were told, by the awesome front end servers, that there were many smiles, nice compliments and heartfelt thanks received from the hundreds of deserving family members who attended the August 25, annual "Back-to-School" event.

Let me begin with by recognizing Jeff Weissman for the yummy breakfast "goodies" and coffee that helped quell our hunger pains and to David Halbrook and Alan Merry who picked up the food, the grill and the supplies early in the morning. Fred Lupton arrived with the 1000 ears of corn, freshly picked Friday morning in Yakima. Fred and his son had driven to Wapato to pick up this wonderful produce. Facing a truck load of corn, the "shucking crew," including David Halbrook, Fred Lupton, Alan Merry, Ed Sterner, Scott and Wendy Wans, Marj Ando, and Jeff Weissman, took over and shucked and stacked 1,000 ears of corn in a little over an hour. I heard a lot of laughing and swapping of stories as Sally and I were snipping and putting clusters of yummy grapes into hundreds of small bags. Craig Sternagel was right-on when he suggested we include some fresh food. The fresh-picked corn, and red and green grapes were a big hit with all.

Some of the thousand ears of corn the crew shucked
Photo by Marj Ando

Scott Wands took over the "chef d'jour" duties, lighting the grills to heat water for the corn and the hot dogs, and kept the "kitchen" functioning, along with Sharon Brooksbanks, Randy Lehman and I, Carol Dahl, while Heidi Shepherd set up the "self-serve restaurant" with expert help of Kathy Martin, Marj Ando Wendy Wands, Sally Renn, Ed Sterner, Jeff Weissman,

Fred Lupton, Alan Merry, Allison Merry and, Dic Lawson. The cleanup crew of David Halbrook, Alan Merry, Chuck Paulsen, Sharon Brooksbank and Randy Lehman left the area in good shape.

A smooth, well-tuned operation emerged with lots of smiles and love dispensed by our Rotarians along with the tasty food. The standard has been raised with the addition of the fabulous corn and crisp grapes. A huge bouquet of thanks to all of the Rotarians who devoted over 70 hours of volunteer time to make Saturday's Back-to-School" event so successful. 

If you are at the LFP Farmers Market on a future Sunday, please stop at Pedro Esquivel's stall located in the row of stalls at the east side of the market, purchase some of his wonderful produce and thank him for his generosity. He provided our Rotary with over 1,000 ears of corn and the melon for a little over $200. Pedro also donates many pounds and varieties of produce to the Terrace View Presbyterian Church food bank in Mountlake Terrace every week.

Left over hot dogs and buns, available for grilling, will be on the menu along with Pedro's watermelons, being kept cold and served at our upcoming 5th Wednesday LFP Rotary gathering at Sheridan Beach this week.

Also to be acknowledged is Clean Scapes Recycling who delivered, specifically for our event, six large bins on Friday for the corn husks and cobs, food and paper scraps which they will pick up on Monday to be composted - all free of cost to us. This is a company who demonstrates "Service Above Self." They service Shoreline, not LFP.

Again, thanks for providing much needed services to families in our community.