Many thanks to our organizer and displaying artist, Marsha Krygier, and all our artists.

Beyond the Fringe – Susan Bergs, handsewn purses and sachets

Lone Tree Pottery – Abbey Rothenbuehler

Tina Kellogg, glass artist

Earth Spirit Pottery – Nancy Williams

Swing Station Studio, Heather Hallberg – handmade purses and housewares  

Fox Ryde Gardens, Susan Buchele Rowland & Curtis Rowland – handcrafted herbal products

Amber Lovelace – fused glass jewelry

L.E. Smith Artworks, Leslie Smith – jewelry

Carr Creative, Ann Carr – handsewn women's jackets, tops, capris and accessories

Monty Weymouth, photographer

John I. Giem, Woodworker (work can be seen at Timeless Creations)

Sage Designs – Rochelle Sage, fountains, pottery, mosaic art

Shiloh Soapworks – Kaylene Baughman, handmade soaps

Saturday, June 19, 12-4, Rolland Moore Park

All Proceeds Benefiting The Matthews House Event

Presented by Veritas and Sponsored by The Wright Life.

Complementary Food Provided by Mama Roni's Pizza.

Tournament Rules:

• 7-12 person Co-ed teams, ages 13-18
• Double Elimination,
• Standard Ultimate Frisbee Rules
• Prize for the Winning Team: Gift Certificates to the Wright Life 

Registration Fee: $5 Pre-registration. $8 Day-of-event Registration More info and registration on event Facebook page

Enjoy breakfast for a donation at Snooze, An A.M. Eatery, 144 W Mountain, Fort Collins. At their pre-opening celebration on Saturday, April 17th you can not only be one of the first to dine at the newest location of this popular restaurant, but your delicious meal will be free in exchange for a donation which will go 2/3 to the Matthews House and 1/3 towards the CSU Hospitality/Agriculture Scholarship Fund.

Half the restaurant will be by reservation only, (you can make a reservation here) and half will be for walk-ins.

Hope you can make it – it will tasty!

Everyone needs groceries, so put it on your calendar and plan to shop for your tasty, healthy food next Thursday, March 25th at Whole Foods and help empower at-risk youth to pursue a future of promise and hope!

On Friday night, Dec. 11, Burn Longboards, a new Fort Collins-based company, held an event called Carve for a Cause to benefit the Matthews House.

The event featured longboards crafted by Burn and painted by local artists, Taylor Gallegos, Scotty Roebuck, Dustin Groeneman and Elle Martinez. These boards were auctioned off while guests enjoyed good company, beer donated by Odell Brewing and appetizers from Cafe Vino.

We are thrilled to be the beneficiary of this well-organized and successful event which raised over $1,500 for the Matthews House!

Not only did we raise a significant amount of money for our program, but we also made great connections with community members who will get involved as mentors and in other support and advocacy roles.

This was a great partnership and we thank Burn Longboards owner Moses Horner and intern Katie Powell for the opportunity to be involved and for all the hard work they put into making this event a classy and tremendously successful event.

Last Wednesday, we got together for our November Family Dinner, also known as our Thanksgiving Feast.

Once a month, we host a dinner for youth in our program and their guests. This is a time to just come to the house and have a tasty family style meal prepared by wonderful volunteers in a comfortable space. Each of our youth can bring along family, friends, a mentor – whoever they would like to spend the evening with. Sometimes after dinner there's a card game, charades, or an outdoor activity, sometimes just hanging out and talking.

This month, in honor of Thanksgiving, Ken Smith, one of our Board members and a professor in CSU's Restaurant and Resort Management program, organized a group of his students to prepare a traditional Thanksgiving meal of turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, veggies and topped off with delicious pie.

About 50 youth, staff, volunteers, family and mentors descended on the house for a festive evening of giving thanks!

If you've been shopping at Whole Foods in Fort Collins recently there's a good chance you've been asked if you would like to add a donation to your grocery bill in order to help people in need in our community this holiday season. If you've said yes, we'd like to say "Thank You!"

This is part of Whole Foods Market’s annual Grab and Give campaign. As a recipient organization, the Matthews House received $4,000 in healthy groceries last Wednesday morning. To help you imagine how much food that it, it took us 3-pick-up truck loads! This food will go to our youth and their families over the holidays and into the new year, helping them to plan and prepare healthy meals.

We are so thankful to the Fort Collins community for their generosity, to Whole Foods for running this campaign and for allowing us to be a recipient of this generosity from our community!

On Friday, Dec 11, Burn Longboards will be hosting Carve for a Cause to raise funds for The Matthews House.

Burn Longboards is a new Fort Collins company, founded in 2009 by Moses Horner and dedicated to producing quality boards for all skill levels. Involvement in the community is hugely important to Burn so they created Carve for a Cause!

Local artists will be participating in this event by turning longboards into works of art. Each artist has been given 3 longboards to work with and the boards will be auctioned off silent auction style with proceeds going to The Matthews House.

There will be music, food, beverages, good company and lots of fun to be had!

Odell Brewing has generously donated beer for those who attend the event to enjoy. Cafe Vino will be providing free appetizers for the event and a cash wine bar for guests. 

On behalf of Burn Longboards and the Matthews House, we hope you can come out and join us for this event!

TICKETS

$10 suggested

RSVP appreciated but not required

or ask questions, please contact Katie Powell at (703)989-8101 or burnlongboards@gmail.com

WHEN

Friday, December 11, 2009 7:00-9:00pm

WHERE

Café Vino 1200 S College Ave. Fort Collins, CO 80524

Enjoy complimentary breakfast and learn about how the Matthews House is changing the lives of at-risk youth in our community.

Hear from Jerri Howe, Matthews House Founder and Executive Director, Magistrate Berenato, Juvenile Magistrate for the 8th Judicial District, and from youth who have been personally impacted by the Matthews House.

When
Thursday, September 24th, 2009
7:00 to 8:30am
7:00am Coffee and conversation
7:30 – 8:30am Program and light breakfast

Where
Hilton Fort Collins
425 W Prospect, Fort Collins

RSVP
For more information or to RSVP, please contact Joyce Dickens at 970-472-4293 or joyce@thematthewshouse.org

“A great feeling of accomplishment”, ” a real blessing”, and ” a uniquely wonderful running experience!” were all ways this year’s runners described their Wild West Relay adventure. Kristin, who has run with us two years says “I have really enjoyed running the WWR both years that I did it. It is a challenge, but the challenge is well worth your effort when you finish one of your legs at 2am with your van full of teammates cheering you on. I don’t know if I would do the WWR if I wasn’t running for a cause, like with the Matthews House. It gives every step of training, fundraising and actual race added purpose.”   And Natalie, who ran for the first time this year says, “I loved the relay!  Every bit of it; and I know how cheesy that sounds, but its true!  I liked running under the moon late in the night the best I think.  I really wasn’t sure what to expect coming into the race… but the organization of the Matthew House and the WWR volunteers just blew me away!  I will definately go again next year…”

This has been the overwhelming sentiment of our teams over the past 3 years, “I loved it, sign me up for next year.” This year we had 10 repeat runners and 14 first-timers which allowed us to field two complete teams. In addition to training to run between 11 and 19 miles over the course of about 30 hours, each runner took on the additional responsibility of raising money for the Matthews House. This year that fundraising took the form of a community yard sale, a dining event at Cafe Mexicali and a benefit concert/silent auction at Everyday Joe’s in addition to many letters to friends, family and coworkers. Through all these efforts our runners raised over $7,700! Thanks to all our runners: Brian Hansen, Seth Daire, Steve Griffin, Missy Larson, Jennifer McLoudrey, Gail Doesken, Linda Maher, Teresa Schoger, Lauren Wylie, Kristin Higgins, Anna Baldwin, Joyce Dickens, Erin Gladu, Steve Redder, Randy Stinson, Mindy Murphy, Amanda Helfer, Katie McGrail, Jonathan Splittgerber, Todd Howe, Yale Norris, Isaac Howe, Natalie Scholander and Mahala Proch and drivers Jerri Howe and Mike Maher.

Although this is the third year that The Matthews House has participated in the Wild West Relay, this year we made a serious addition. For the first time we took advantage of an opportunity to have a non-profit exchange through Volunteers with a Purpose, an official relay partner. This allowed us to have 16 volunteers assist as race marshals AND help raise over $1800 for the Matthews House in the process. Sometimes this involved directing an occasional unruly runner or moody van driver. But in general, I think our volunteers encountered great people and had a good time being involved. We also had 8 other volunteers help with a pancake and coffee fundraiser at the exchange that raised around $600 to benefit the Matthews House. One of our volunteers commented that she had so much fun volunteering she may even want to run the race next year!

Thanks to our race marshalls: Joel and Tina Vosberg, Craig and Lotta Vollmer, Brian Lindecker, Eileen O’Malley, Laura Harris, Scott and Mary Gordon, Greg and Becky Kendall, Keah Redder, Wes and Elissa Hoffert, Cathy Rotman, and Linda Wright.

Thanks to our Pancake and Coffee team: Jill and Curt Bear, Nicole and Zach Armstrong, Jennifer Sory, Danielle Sardi, Chad Price and Kory Nickell.

We are so grateful that you were willing to make a significant contribution of your time and efforts on behalf of the Matthews House. Thank you for caring and desiring to make a difference in the lives of at-risk youth!

Thanks for joining together to raise over $10,000 for the Matthews House!

And thanks again to our sponsors!