Over 200 people showed up to the Fort Collins Country Club to have a rock’n 1950′s style good time. They enjoyed live performances from the likes of Elvis, Marilyn Monroe, and Judy Garland.

SugarMill Productions was also on hand to entertain the crowd. And thanks to a swing lesson and dance off from the Jumpin’ Jive Cats folks were cutting a rug well into the night.

And amongst all the 50′s festivities there was also a lot of fundraising going on. All told the evening brought in over $13,000 for The Matthews House!

Check out these photos from the event:

It would not be possible to have such a good time while helping the at-risk youth of our community without the support of our Hoopla for Hope sponsors:

Our “Hot Rod” sponsor was Realities for Children.

We had these “T-Bird” sponsors:  Cornerstone Mortgage Company, Bighorn Family Dental, Tenfold Collective, Northern Colorado Business Report, and Fort Collins Country Club.

And the “Jukebox” sponsors were: Pure Energy, LLC, Yancey’s, Re/Max, North Beach Dental, Lighthouse Chiropractic, Odell Brewing Company, Tandem Select, Snowy Peaks Winery, eSquared Exceptional Events, Hal & Ki Johnson, and Craig Vollmer Photography.

Additional thanks are due to: All our Matthews House Ambassadors, Auctioneer – Jeff Sweeney, Chipper’s Lanes, Sam’s Club, Marilyn Foster and our Living Legends – Kristi Siedow-Thompson, Robb Copp, Ann Foorman, Vi Wickam, & Christina Gressianu.

Talk about “win-win!” You get your gear ready for the winter while you help at-risk youth in Larimer County.

The Wright Life is an alternative sports store  founded in 1981 by Bill Wright. The store is manned by an experienced and enthusiastic staff that live their motto, “We deliver fun.” They offer an amazing range of products for snowboarding, skateboarding, disc golf, ultimate, hacky, and many other alternative sports.

Their store is located in Old Town Ft Collins at 200 Linden. (click for map)

You can also visit them online at www.wrightlife.com, find them on Facebook, and connect on Twitter.

On November 10th, please plan to join us in the sock-hoppin’, hot-roddin’, greased-lightnin’, world of the 1950s. You might even catch a glimpse of Marilyn or Elvis.

This peachy-keen evening will feature:

• A disc jockey spinning the catchiest 50′s tunes for your dancing pleasure
• The Jumpin’ Jive Cats will be on hand for a dance lesson and to judge a dance off
• Gourmet appetizers, delectable cupcakes and swell drinks
• A photo booth with props so you can preserve your memories of a fabulous evening
• A costume contest with prizes for the best 50′s individual, couple and group.

There will also be a live and silent auction where you can all kinds of neat-o items and experiences, including a trip to Beaver Creek where you’ll stay in ski-in, ski-out style with your own personal chef and ski instructor.

You won’t want to miss this!

Costumes encouraged, but of course not required. Hosted & DJ’d by Leonard Kiel of Colorado Sound.

To purchase tickets, go to thematthewshouse.org or call (970) 472-4293 The festivities begin
at 7:00 pm and tickets are only $45.

This amazing event is made possible by our sponsors:

Our Hot Rod Sponsor:

Our T-Bird Sponsors:

Our Jukebox Sponsors:

Did you know that Fort Collins has a Peach Festival?

Maybe not, but you won’t want to miss it.

This first-year-event is coming up THIS SATURDAY (9/10/11)and benefits The Matthews House, The Gardens on Spring Creek, and Fort Collins Rotary Clubs (What is Rotary anyway?).

The event will be held at the Gardens on Spring Creek and kick off with a 5k run at 8:30am, followed by a peachy pancake breakfast at 9 (for runners and non-runners, by donation), a kid’s fun run at 9:30am and then the official opening of the festival at 10 with all kinds of fun for the whole family. There will be no admission charged to the festival, so you can come pick and choose where you want to spend your money on food, drinks or fun for the kids.

Here are the fun and tasty things you can expect to choose from:

Come join us for an hour or the whole day, it should be a great and tasty time.

For more info, visit FortCollinsPeachFestival.com

Very early next Friday morning,  August 12, The Matthews House will have a team lining up for the Wild West Relay for the 5th year in a row. Like the other 100+ teams, our team of 12 will be running 200 miles from Fort Collins to Steamboat Springs. However, we’ll be running in order to raise money for the Matthews House to help youth whose childhood’s were stolen by neglect and abuse, to learn to dream and thrive.

This race will take our team about 30 hours, during which each runner will run 3 separate times for a total of 12-20 miles each. As part of the team, each runner has committed to raising $650 for the Matthews House and training for this challenging (and incredibly fun!) adventure. Our team has set an ambitious goal of raising over $9,000, and we are oh so very close!

This year’s team is: Stacy Friday, Chris Branchflower, Jessi Pitmon, Debby Myers, Brian Hansen, Steve Griffin, Doug Douillard, Gwen Koenig, Stephen Koenig, Joyce Dickens, Kristina Maxwell and Daryle Dickens.

If you’d like to support these 12 amazing runners who are volunteering their time and energy (lots of it) to help youth in our community, you can learn more about them and support them here.

Thank you to our Team Sponsors

Brian & Esther with Matthews House Volunteer Coordinator, Vanessa Aschmann

Every year at their State of the Community event, United Way of Larimer County recognizes outstanding volunteers in the community. At the 2011 event, on June 9th, the Volunteer Excellence Award was presented to our very own 2010 Volunteers of the Year, Brian & Esther Hansen, recognizing their truly extraordinary commitment to serving their community. Brian & Esther have been doing outstanding work, empowering youth through their work with The Matthews House since it was founded in late 2005.

They’ve helped in unseen ways like cleaning the house in the evening or weekend when no one was around, as well as directly working with youth by acting as mentors and even inviting several of our young adults into their home through our Host Home program. Over the past 5 years, they’ve been involved in about every way imaginable and we are incredibly grateful for their support. We were thrilled to be able to celebrate this recognition with Esther at the State of the Community event and see them honored.

Of course in characteristic fashion she used her few minutes in the spotlight to talk up the Matthews House and make sure all 700 guests knew exactly what we do.

Thank you to all 165 of the volunteers who make the successes seen here at the Matthews House a reality!

Excellent photos by Craig Vollmer Photography.

On May 5th, over 330 guests gathered for our 4th Annual Cultivate Hope Garden Party Benefit to celebrate Spring. This garden party celebrates life and the new growth that can happen when young people are given the resources and support they need to grow and blossom.

Guests enjoyed an outdoor garden party hosted by emcee Scott Beasley which included food and drink, a garden-themed silent auction, live music from The Love Royale and the chance to win flowers for a year from Bath Garden Center. Then everyone moved inside for coffee and dessert and the chance to hear a collection of personal stories of success told by The Matthews House alumni.

Also, for the first time ever, a Volunteer of the Year award was presented. The recipients for 2010 were Brian & Esther Hansen who have given well over 1100 hours of service and mentoring as well as hosting youth in their home.

There was no ticket price for this event, instead all guests were asked to consider making a contribution to help the Matthews House continue and expand the services it provides to youth in need in our community. The community responded generously and over $20,000 was raised to go directly to programming at The Matthews House.

Thank you to everyone who attended and contributed!

During that period, customers buying bags of coffee from their shop (located at 749 S. Lemay A-2) can select one of the chosen charities, I recommend The Matthews House, as recipient of a portion of the sale. $1 of each 12 oz. bag and 50 cents of each 4 oz. bag will be donated to the nonprofit of your choice!

Here’s a chance to take care of that coffee lover on your Christmas list or buy some beans for your New Years brunch and help local youth this holiday season.