It was a Toastmaster Weekend to remember.
For the first time in my Toastmaster career, we had Winter TLI in December. It was nice to see Westmoreland County Community College decked out for Christmas 🎄.
We had a great turnout for our Winter TLI as 143 people showed up though it did seem like there was almost 200 there. Our chair Elizabeth Carter kept the event moving and everything was on time. I helped out by purchasing wraps from Walmart for the box lunches and picking up six cases of water. Because a Toastmaster needs water during their training.
The Spring Conference chairs Jim and Michelle Teague got me to sign up early to help out with the event. They got a good list of sign ups on Saturday and more will be on the way. This makes me think it’s going to be a great conference.
Our day started with a presentation by Sarah Andreas. One of the things that stood out from her talk was that we had to list three things about ourselves. A couple of the things I mentioned was that I’m stylish and that I’m insecure. She talked about some of her books which she had for sale at her table.
From the first keynote speaker it was off to our Division Breakout. Our Division C Director, Brett Aristegui, led a marvelous session and introduced the current and past district leaders including me. We got an opportunity to sign up to help out with upcoming speech contests and TLI makeups. I’m putting my hat in the ring and helping out all across Division C and with all four Division contests once again. From State College to Johnstown and Oakmont, I’ll be everywhere this contest season.
I then attended Club Growth Director Bob Johnson’s session on Retaining and Gaining Members. We broke off into teams and did some brainstorming on how to maintain membership.
Carol Snyder and I ran the secretary training and we had 12 people show up. It was a Q&A session more or less. We got enough done to accommodate the hourlong session.
I stayed in the room and took part in Nate Stephens’ Effective Evaluation session. We evaluated a speech and played Evaluation Bingo. We learned what a good evaluator and bad one do.
The workshop wrapped up with Fred Vornbrock leading a Dale Carnegie Training that we all enjoyed.
At the end of the day, I got high praises on my blog by the Division B Director, Terye Carney. She encouraged me to keep working on it and not give up. I had multiple people complementing me on my stylish attire. The houndstooth scarf was a big hit.
The next day at Achievers, we had a small turnout but two great speeches. Jim Teague gave his icebreaker and broke it down into three phases. Fred Vornbrock gave a speech about the idea of having a speech-craft event and asked us all for advice.
Jim and I discussed the possibility of his wife joining Achievers and I said I ask her to join. We also talked about a dedicated Johnstown member as a possible new addition to the club.
Yesterday was a day off for me. So naturally, I made the drive up to Cranberry for my visit to the Cranberry High Noon club meeting. I was so impressed with the greeting I got. Everyone was so happy to see me (this was my sixth visit to the club since I began attending in 2016). I even got called my new blog name. They even wanted the link to my blog.
The meeting itself went well. Three excellent speeches, a great Table Topics session (where I gave my 20 things I want to in 2020), and great evaluations from seasoned members.
After the meeting, we had some baked goods and socialized. One of the members even asked me how I picked out my stylish clothes every day. I did mention the reason why I started dressing nicer. She thought it was nice that one of my coworkers inspired me to dress more stylish.
I spent time last night reading over the comments from my visit. Definitely one of my best trips ever and one of my best Toastmaster weekends ever. Thank you for letting me get in on the picture as well.
One week to Christmas. ❤️ you.
Stylish 🍒 