2025 May/AGM meeting highlights

 

Location: Banbury Center
Date: Sunday May 25, 2025

Organizing Committee:

• Robert B.
• Marlene & Bill M.
• Andy N. & Don R.

Theme: Summer!

Due to the cancellation of the March meeting, the AGM will take place in the May meeting.

1. Annual General Meeting
• Due to the fact that our March meeting was cancelled due to weather condition, our AGM took place in the May meeting.
• The club used this meeting to discuss club businesses that happened in the past year as well as plans for the upcoming fiscal year.  At the same time, election of executive member positions also took place.  This year, the positions that were up for re-elections were President, Vice President and Treasurer.  
• We were happy to report that Dennis, John and Rick agreed to put their names forward for the nominations of the executive positions they currently held and that they won their respective positions by acclamation.


2. Display
   • the theme is "Summertime activities"
   • Because Department 56 is mostly associated with Christmases and Halloweens, the challenge for everyone is to come up with a display using 1 or more Department 56 items that captures what one may do during the summer season.  
   • Participating in a sports event, watching a parade, or attending a wedding are some possible activities.
   • As you can see from the photographs, our club members sure brought about some original ideas in showing how one could make a summer activity display using Department 56 items.
   
   
3. "Who's the Collector?" activity
   • So, exactly how well do you know your fellow collector friends?
   • this game/activity is for everyone in the audience to figure out who collects what
   • we will have everyone writing down a number of non-Department 56 collections he or she owns on a piece of paper (make sure to leave out your name!).  
     • A collection can be huge, such as stamps, buttons, seashells from vacation spots, etc or small, like 3 vintage Rolls Royces. 
   • We draw from papers collected and everyone guesses who the collector is
   
   
4. A "Word Search" game where everyone is given a grid of letters to locate a list of given words associated with TVCC.

2025 March/AGM meeting

 

Location: Banbury Center
Date: Sunday March 30, 2025

Organizing Committee:

• Lucy H.
• Gail & John H.
• Bonnie M.

Theme: TBD

• Meeting was cancelled due to poor weather condition

2025 January meeting

 

Location: Banbury Center
Date: Sunday January 26, 2025

Organizing Committee:

• Cherie S.
• Dennis & Ruth T.

Theme: New Beginnings/Time

1. Display
   • Everyone is asked to bring a display that fits in with the theme of the meeting: New Beginnings/Time.  That can be a display with a clock in it or something more abstract that indicates a fresh start or new ideas.
   • Many members brought their A game and came up with various wonderful and imaginative displays that heed to the theme of “Time”.
   
   
2. Display Demo
   • "Pick Parade" – how can you use picks in your displays?
   • Cherie, as usual, did a fantastic job in showing everyone what one can do with various picks and crafting material you find in craft stores to enhance your display
   
   
3. Bingo Game

2024 November/Christmas/30th Anniversary Meeting highlights

Location: Banbury Center
Date: Sunday November 24, 2024

Organizing Committee:

• the club executives

Theme:  Nostalgia ... happy memories from the past

1. Annual Christmas pot-luck
   • one of the popular activities for our November meetings has always been the pot-luck lunch as all club members showcase their culinary skills and bring in delicious food items to share with everyone
2. 30^th Anniversary celebration
        
3. “Nostalgic displays”
   • note that some of these displays reference our club’s 30th anniversary by including items, such as special signages and pearls; the latter being the symbol for a 30th anniversary representing purity, honesty and wisdom
4. Gift exchange (aka White elephant game)
   • following the rule of the White Elephant gift exchange party game, each club member drew a number to determine the order in which he/she would be picking a wrapped gift
   • when your number is called, you could either pick 1 gift from the pile of gifts collected or steal a gift that was previously picked by someone else
   • the best part of the game is obviously the unwrapping after all had picked their gifts
5. Gift card donations
   • the club selected the organization YOUTH WITHOUT SHELTER as the recipient of our gift card donations this year; it is a charity offering shelter and support for youth facing homelessness in the Toronto area
   • click on this link to learn more about this wonderful organization
   • our club members responded generously as always and more than $130 of gift cards were collected
   • Yvette graciously delivered the gift cards on the club’s behalf