The BRFAL Chapter
was selected to host the annual Virginia Master Naturalist state conference earlier this year. Do you think we were scared to take on this
huge responsibility? You bet we were!
Fortunately for
us we have the WE Skelton 4H Center at our disposal. Not only does it
have a sufficiently large campus to host the potential number of attendees, it
is in a bucolic setting suitable for Master Naturalists.
We also felt good
in the knowledge that we would get experience and expert help from VMN State
Coordinator Michelle Prysby and her right hand helpers Tiffany Brown and Terri
Keffert. But otherwise we were really
scared.
But then our
BRFAL President, Kathy Scott stepped up to the plate and formed a team of about
7 BRFAL conference coordinators to help get this thing going. As the start date of August 26th approached, our knees were aknockin’. Then they told us that there would be about 250 attendees, a new record high! Yikes!
Well we sucked it up, put out heads down and did what we had to do. With the help of numerous volunteers from visiting chapters as well as BRFAL volunteers the whole thing seemed to fly by with nary a hitch. We received many compliments about how well it went. We are glad we did it. We are glad it’s over. We’re glad another chapter will be doing it next year!
Here are a few pix for you to enjoy.
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| Dem Donnelly's |
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| Old men, not at work |
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| Happy surprise birthday party Michelle! |
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| Charlotte checkin' 'em in |
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| Connie straightening things up |
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| The throngs |
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| Kathy showing off the butterfly bottles |
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| Beth & Paul cheesin' |
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| Hey what's that guy doing with my wife? |
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| Leslie Santapaul instructing buffer gardens |
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| BRFAL Conference Coordinators with State VMN Top Brass |
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| All the BRFALers we could collect in one spot |
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| Photo contest judges struggling to pick the best pix |
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| 100 years of BRFALers - Guy is 86 and Neil is 14 |
Great conference, great team, great photos! Thanks for all the conference planning committee put into this great success!! I have heard only compliments and thank you's from participants for BRFAL hosting the event. You all have made the 2016 State Conference a tough act to follow.
ReplyDeleteI am passing on this feedback from one of our chapter presidents: "Since you are in the BRFAL chapter, please send my personal thanks to everyone in your chapter for all their work on the conference. It was outstanding, which means that an awful lot of time, effort, and planning went into the details. All of you deserve to feel proud of the good work!
ReplyDeleteSusan McSwain
President, Central Blue Ridge chapter"
Thank you BRFAL for doing a great job with the conference! I wrote a blog article about my experience at the conference: http://wp.me/p5ETXr-8p
ReplyDelete