Yonni's Birthday

Back row - Sae, Haruka, Kelly, Laura; Front row - Emi, Yonni, Emily

Emily invited us over to her place for dinner to celebrate Yonni's birthday. It was a potluck dinner. As usual I brought apple pie that I bought from Metro. Trust me... I had everyone's best interest in mind. You don't want to eat my cooking.

Contrary to what the above picture shows it wasn't only me and the girls in attendance. As well as me, Mark, Kyle, Steven and Danny represented the boys. Only I never got a shot of them. Steven really wasn't a big fan of having Kyle and I taking many pictures. C'est la vie.

As well as Yonni's birthday we celebrated Danny and Sae getting engaged. He recently proposed. Steven played a sort of newlywed game where Sae and Danny had to answer questions to see how well they knew each other. It was kind of a silly game. Oh well.

We also sung on Emily's roomate's friend's Karaoke machine. Actually, it was mostly me who used it. It kept everyone entertained one way or another.

OOTC Dishwashing Crew - 2011

This is a photo of the 2011 version of the dishwashing crew at the Out of the Cold program at Knox Presbyterian Church. From left are Sam, Yonni, Pattra and myself. Missing are Harim and Daphne (who took the picture).

These guys have been great helping out. Sam and Yonni are great with the dishwasher. Pattra, Harim and Daphne put the clean dishes and pots and pans away. While I'm at the double-sink pre-scrubbing all the gunk off the pots and pans before we run them through the washer. We run like a well-oiled machine.

Still, at the height of the rush, things can get pretty intense. Piles and piles of dirty dishes flood in after the youths finish eating. We really have to move quickly otherwise things will pile up in one area or another. Thanks to the extraordinary effort of this great team we always manage to squeak by.

Over the five or so years I've been helping at Knox, I've met a lot of wonderful people. Many of them have moved on, but there are a few stalwart volunteers. Vicki and Bill (the organizers) are two of course. And there's Pat and Holly who prepare the food, and Darlene who runs the sewing clinic. Pat has been around for a long time. He's a real trooper. I'm certainly blessed to have met all these amazing people.