Happy Birthday, Toastmasters! Meeting Recap - October 22, 2009

Hello Fellow Marsh Wind Toastmasters! I hope this day finds you staying warm and sunny in your hearts and celebrating each day as if it is your birthday. Here’s to you!

Mark Forsberg, DTM, did the honors of preparing the room, and being our Sergeant-at-Arms. He ably remembered that today is exactly the 85^th anniversary of the official beginnings of Toastmasters, an auspicious date to be sure. He shared the thoughts of the Toastmasters International President, Gary Schmidt, to start us off, stating that to communicate ideas well is a means of “improving life in all its phases”. Here’s to improving phases!

After a few words of welcome to our guest, James, our co-VP Membership, Deborah Dora, CTM, glided smoothly into her role as both Ah-Counter and Grammarian. Her choice of word for the day for this celebration: Razzle-dazzle. Her ah-counting report at the end of the meeting demonstrated world-class listening abilities. Here’s to incredible listening without the razzle-dazzle!

Filling in the role of timer at the last minute was our other co-VP Membership, Ruth Fernandez. She made the job look much easier than it actually is, to be sure, so here’s to keeping time effortlessly!

We had three outstanding presenters who shared their expertise and stories with us today:

Stacey Modahl, co-Sergeant-at-Arms, gave her Ice Breaker entitled, "The Challenge”. The story was eloquently relayed and masterfully written speech about a two-mile outdoor swimming race. Inspirational thinking abounding as we heard, ”Think positive… you’ll be fine!” Stacey was awarded the coveted “Toastmaster of the Day Award” for her very first speech! Here’s to you, Stacey!

Lee Handwerger, VP Education delivered his eighth speech entitled, ”It’s Optional”. His humor did not end with this tricky title, as his speech was on the buying and selling of options, a skill that he has expertise in and will use well in his new-new job at Cargill. Here’s to new-new jobs and all the best to Lee!

Betty Liedtke, DTM, gave the first half of an inspirational speech that is slated to be the keynote address at the upcoming Distirct 6 conference this weekend. In response to the district’s motto this year, “Dare to be Distinguished!”, she entitled her talk “In Undistinguished Company”. Her speech in one word: amazing. Here’s to hearing the speech in its entirety soon and perhaps every year!

Ralph Smedley, the founder of Toastmasters 85 years ago, said “The ability to approach an audience in a friendly style is partly a gift of nature, and partly a cultivated art. It is worth cultivating if you want to be as effective as possible in your speech”. Celebrating 85 years of individual personal growth, here’s to Toastmasters! Happy Day!

Toastmaster Dawn Anderson

President, Marsh Winds Toastmasters Club #7179

Marshwinds Member Tells Brush with Fame Story in Toastmaster Magazine

Scoring Points with a Sports Celebrity

Lisa Jenks, of the Marsh Winds Toastmasters club in Minnetonka, Minnesota, was surprised while working in a local lumber yard as a cashier. She says, “Kirby Puckett of the Minnesota Twins baseball team came through my line. It was early in his career, but he was already a very popular player. He wrote a check, and I began to say ‘Can I see your driver's license?’ Embarrassed, I caught myself part way through the sentence – ‘Never mind, I know who you are!’" But as she regained her composure, Lisa figured out exactly what to do. She notes, “Being a huge baseball fan, I could not believe I almost asked Kirby Puckett for identification! I grabbed a scrap of paper and asked for an autograph, which he cheerfully signed.”

Read more Toastmasters What Do You Say to a Celebrity? stories.

Marsh Winds Meeting Recap - October 15, 2009

Larry Everett served as TM with the theme “Reflections on Education", and Stacey Modahl served as the Table Topics Master, and did a wonderful job with selecting questions relative to the theme meeting.

Since this was MEA Week, the theme for the meeting was "Reflections on Education", and participants were asked to think about a teacher or someone who had a significant impact on his or her life. In many ways, all of us are "teachers" - helping children, family, and/or friends.

We had two speakers, Joe Muniz with a speech from the C&L manual, topic #2, Organize Your Speech. His title was “Find your Strength.” Hegave an impressive speech related to his work as a Marketing Sales Manager for a local IT firm.

Ravi Bakshi was our second speaker with a speech from the C&L manual, topic #8. The title was “Joys of Leadership – A Learning Experience”. His speech content related some of the challenges he has with serving as the Area 92 Governor for the current Toastmaster year. Ravi is repeating C&L manual.

General Evaluator – Pamela Sakayan (practicing her improvisational character - Olga Katrina). She is our club comedian, and helped to make the meeting livelier.

Grammarian – Ruth Fernandez with word of the day “inspiration”. All were inspired who attended the meeting.

Ah Counter – Tom Schmid

Timer – Lee Handwerger

Sergeant-at-Arms – Jennifer Ray

Toastmaster of the Day was awarded to Larry Everett for bringing the meeting together. There were a number of open duty positions open the night before the meeting, but concerned members appeared and help to make this an inspired meeting.

Since we only had two speakers, we had time for 4 or 5 table topics. Several members listed above had an opportunity to reflect on the theme, including Lynn Nodland, who was also present.

Three guests attended the meeting.

New Board Members

Though this announcement may be a bit overdue, please join me in welcoming our newest Marsh Winds Toastmasters Board Members -

• Ruth Fernandez, co-VP Membership
• Stacey Modahl, co-Sergeant at Arms
• Lynn Nodland, Secretary

Your service is greatly appreciated and welcomed!

Pesky Project #8 - CL Manual

At this time, your VP of Public Relations and your VPs of Membership would like to offer opportunities for you to complete Pesky Project 8 in the Competent Leader Manual.

The challenging requirements for completion of this project include service as a contest chair, membership campaign chair or PR campaign chair. Suffice it to say, there are limited opportunities to serve as contest chair, so a PR or membership campaign may be your best opportunity to complete Pesky Project 8.

Here are some of preliminary ideas for membership or PR Campaigns that may be taken on:

Promoting the colloquium****

Promoting the spring contests

Membership/guest contest

Website redesign

Blogging

Press release campaign

Guest packets

Slide show/PowerPoint creation

New display board

Create/maintain Facebook group

URDB World record campaign

Visitor follow up

****We are in immediate need of someone to take a lead role in promoting the upcoming colloquium (November 12th).

Leading a campaign would involve putting together a team (of maybe even 2 or 3) and coordinating efforts to complete the project. Your VP of PR and VPs of Membership will offer guidance as needed.

By no means would this be an exhaustive list, and the possibilities are limited only be imagination (and maybe money). Please contact Lisa Jenks (PR), Deborah Dora (Membership) or Ruth Fernandez (Membership) to discuss the opportunities.

We thank you for your contributions to Marsh Winds!