Associate-Active & Life-Active Status

To all associate and life members:

We have a proposal for you!

We've heard many comments from Associate and Life members who have mentioned how much they miss being directly involved with the chapter. Obviously, they are happy to be "free" from the big hour requirements - but they miss participating in our projects, having a say in the projects and events that we participate in and definitely the fellowship with other members at meetings.

Enter the Associate-Active and Life-Active status! This is in our constitution and we were not using it! This is a great way for those who miss J.A. to reconnect with our projects and our group. We are a really strong membership with some really dedicated women and we run the chapter really efficiently, but we feel that we can always be better. We need our associate and life members, who still would like to be involved, to help make our chapter even stronger!

This status entitles those members to have most of the rights of active members. They can vote, recruit new members, serve on committees, propose new projects and chair projects - all the things that being a Junior Auxiliary member is about. The only limit is that they may not hold office.

The requirements for this status is that the member must attend at least four general meetings a year and must perform at least 24 hours of service during the year. Their dues will remain the same as their Associate and Life membership status requires.

We currently have 3 associates who have already jumped on board: Tabetha Sullens, Kellie Hutchins, and Pam Cantrell. We thank them for their participation and we are really excited to have them back. Welcome back ladies!

If you are interested in taking on this status; please call President Natalie Miller 607-2945 or Ex Officio Susan Burks 273-4195.

One of our main goals this year is to strengthen our chapter and to make our chapter more recognizable in the community for the type of service that we do. We think that we can help even more people this way - with more hands on board especially - since that is what our purpose really is.

As always, Associate and Life members are welcome to help us out with projects without this special status. But why not put those hours towards that 24 hour requirement and be an even more involved part of the chapter again?

After all, we miss you too!

Member Appreciation Brunch

Watch your mailboxes for the official invitation...but here is the information:

Save the Date!

Our Member Appreciation Brunch
will be held at 10:30 am
on Saturday June 14th
at The Inn at Harvest Farms Lake

Tickets are $12 each (to cover expenses).
Members are encouraged to bring a guest if they would like.

Please RSVP by calling Susan Burks 273-4195 or Jennifer Sain 808-1479

The brunch will be in a garden setting. Casual dress is fine.


Come join us for an event that is sure to become a J.A. of McMinnville tradition - fun, door prizes, several awards including a 2007-2008 Member of the Year will be presented!


With this brunch we wish to honor those going active, associate and life this year.
We would like full membership participation...

associate and life members are encouraged to attend.
We would like this to become a tradition for our chapter - a time each year when our entire chapter can come together to exchange ideas,

to celebrate our individual and group accomplishments,

and to reaffirm our commitment to our club and our chapter's purpose in the community.

The Lucy Virginia French Ball - A Bicentennial Celebration

The L. Virginia French Ball is less than two weeks away.

Have you bought your tickets yet?

This will be a formal dance/community social put on by the Bicentennial Executive Committee in honor of one of Warren County's former citizens; Lucy Virginia French.

The L. Virginia French Ball

will be held

at 7:00 pm

on June 7th

at the McMinnville Civic Center

Tickets are $12.50 each

Tickets can be purchased at

- Warren County Executive Building
- Warren County / McMinnville Chamber of Commerce
- McMinnville Civic Center
- Magness Library

-On the night of the event, tickets can be purchased at the door

This will be a great way for the community to come together!

Ladies, It's an excuse to get really dressed up and go out dancing....How often do you get to do that in McMinnville? Guys, this is the perfect idea for a date with your girlfriend/wife...

she'll think you're so romantic for thinking of it!

Bring the kids, bring your parents and grandparents....

It'll be a great event - a chance to hang out with your friends and/or family in a different

setting than the usual Saturday night,

you'll get a little history while you're there maybe,

and on top of all that - you're supporting your community!

We'll see you there!

Check the Warren County 200 Web site for more information on Lucy Virginia French, this event or any of the other upcoming Warren County Bicentennial events.

Who was L. Virginia French?

Lucy Virginia French (1825-1881) was a writer, poet and magazine editor of the Old South. Reared in Virginia and Pennsylvania, she met Col. John Hopkins French at a book store in Memphis, later moving to McMinnville after a whirlwind romance. They settled at the French Plantation Forest Home and Colonel and Mrs. French became the pillars of society as they lavishly entertained local folk as well as dignitaries who visited the town.
Mrs. French was a writer for several popular magazines of the time and became famous across the south and was recognized in national literary circles. When the Civil War erupted in 1861, she was supportive of the Confederacy and "refuged" at nearby Beersheba Springs where she kept diaries that she later became famous for.
That journal remains as a chronicle of the life in McMinnville during the Federal and Confederate occupations of the city.
After the war, French continued to write and publish until her death in 1881. She is buried in Riverside Cemetery in McMinnville. A Tennessee Historical Marker is now located at the sight of the Forest Home on Main Street here in the city.

Grateful

We are grateful to the men and women who have given their lives in service to our nation. Without their sacrifice, the U.S.A. would not be as great, or as free, of a place as it is today.

We hope that you will stop for a moment today to remember those brave men and women. Remember that today is not about the long weekend, it's not about the big sales or the burger grilling...today is about the entire nation coming together to honor those who made the ultimate sacrifice for their nation; for their families, but also for people that they had never even met...those men and women were truly heroes.

[NOTE: To help re-educate and remind Americans of the true meaning of Memorial Day, the "National Moment of Remembrance" resolution was passed on Dec 2000 which asks that at 3 p.m. local time, for all Americans "To voluntarily and informally observe in their own way a Moment of remembrance and respect, pausing from whatever they are doing for a moment of silence or listening to 'Taps." ]

What is Junior Auxiliary?

For those of you who don't know; Junior Auxiliary of McMinnville is a chapter of the National Association of Junior Auxiliaries (NAJA) - a christian-based organization focused on making a lasting difference in our communities by meeting the needs of the citizens, especially the children. Our organization's slogan is "Care Today - Character Tomorrow"...along the same lines of the "Teach a Man to Fish" school of thinking. Click here to see the NAJA website.

We are a group of women, here in McMinnville, who believe that we can make a difference in Warren County and in order to do that, we participate in and host several service projects in the community;

from the fun and family-friendly Christmas in the Park, which has become a community tradition - a music, games and hot apple cider-filled night in downtown McMinnville that encourages family togetherness and community fellowship;

- to Coats for the Community, a project in which we collect donated coats and winter weather items from all over Warren County and then set up at the mall in the fall in order to give out the coats free to families and individuals who need them.

We also host the Junior Miss Warren County Pageant in April and the Snow Princess Pageants in February,

as well as several other fundraising projects in order to raise money to support all the service that we do for Warren County!

We'll be updating this blog pretty regularly so we hope you check back often to see what's going on with our club.

If you have any questions about Junior Auxiliary of McMinnville and our projects, would like to to learn ways that you can help out our organization, or would like to know about our membership requirements; feel free to contact our public relations chair, Ashley Gillentine at ashleys_attic_mcminnville@yahoo.com or talk to any J.A. of McMinnville member that you know.