Our flagship event on Flag Day, Fort Cooper State Park!

Thank you to ALL the Friends of the Shelter that helped out in our first community event this past weekend! We could not have done this without everyone's help, support & participation. Although you couldn't be present, we want to thank Dr.Julie, Pattie Amon & Mike DeRose for their guidance and sweat equity! We also want to give a BIG thank you to Mary Neron our friend from Prescious Paws Rescue,Inc. (presciouspawsflorida.com) for the loan of your 10x10 easy up tent. Once we figured out how easy it actually was to assemble (a first for Anne, Donna & I) - it was just a godsend! THANK YOU!! We really were proud of ourselves and think our tent looked great! I also want to "give a shout out to" Gail Palmer & Mindy Barone our friends from Adopt A Rescued Pet (adoptarescuedpet.com)for making the suggestion that we look into this Flag Day Event!

Beauty (who is up for adoption at CCAS) helped us to make many a new friend: pictured here are (Friends Volunteer)Donna Faucher, (Fort Cooper State Park Manager)Harry Mitchell, (Friends Volunteer)Anne Mangano & of course Beauty! We also want to thank Diane Dye, Forest Ranger at Fort Cooper State Park - for giving us the OK to join the event! (Diane happens to be the sister-in-law of ACO Lora Peckham - its a small world!). Oh, and by the way...if you've never been to Fort Cooper State Park (floridastateparks.org/fortcooper) you've got to go. It a gorgeous park right here in inverness with nearly 5 miles of self-guided nature trails AND its dog friendly (a 6' leash required).


Now we can also brag that WE RAISED $200 through our gift basket raffle & other donations the public were kind enough to extend to us!! Obviously, we have a ways to go to afford our expenses relating to incorporating to our 501(c)(3) but this is a great start! (Friends Volunteer, Pat Rupp, who "never wins anything" was the lucky winner of our Gift Basket, which I'm sure her rescue Golden "Maggie" will greatly enjoy;)

The other wonderful part of our day is that TWO of our shelter dogs were adopted as a result of our exposure at the event:


Little Coco was adopted by Cathy Milano who was exhibiting at the park with her heritage society (it was love at first sight obviously). Also pictured are Shelter Friends, Donna Faucher & Fran Jeffers.


Our new Friend of the Shelter, Bobbie DeWolfe, adopted Scout (the dog formerly known as Humpty). Here Bobbie is shown with Scout and her friend Paulette Bean (who adopted Happy at CCAS just this past week too!)


We also ran into some shelter "alumni" at the event. You all may remember "Joey" the white fluffy havanese pup with "nip" problems. Well...he looked just wonderful and his mom, Shirley Seaman, came by to say hello and show her support. Our Friends supporter Frank Yuelling and his wife Beverly came by to say hi and share ideas for future events together! We also made a new friend, Ellen Bass, who forwarded us the wonderful poem "I Rescued A Human Today" - which I have posted on our blog for everyone to enjoy. Thank you Ellen!

Shelter Friends, Anne Mangano, Frank Yuelling & Samantha Carter.

And of course, there was the wonderful efforts of all the Friends of Volunteers that were able to help & show up the day of the event! Anne Mangano, Donna Faucher, Pat Rupp, Sandy Vogel, Fran Jeffers, Chris Vanerka, Carol Ponsonby & Suzy Warner. We had record temperatures on Saturday...but it was also a record day for getting our momentum going for Friends of Citurs County Animal Services! What a wonderful group of people - working together for our county shelter animals!

Shelter Friend, Sandy Vogel with Bobbie DeWolf & shelter alumni Scout!

Shelter Friend, Pat Rupp taking a break from the heat after transporting our shelter participants.

Lastly, I just want to thank Anne Mangano for ALL of her work making the event happen. She is also the creator & source of our AWESOME new t-shirts which I'm sure everyone agrees were just the icing on the cake for our Flag Day Event and for future community outings! And another "shout out" to our dear Friends of the Shelter, Karen Fink & Donna Sprague "up north" who were with us in spirit! You guys get back to FL soon to help out with our next event;)


Please be sure to pass on a link to this blog if you know anyone you think may like to get involved, join the TEAM....or donate money! They can email us at info@FriendsofCCAS.com
Best,
Samantha, Volunteer