8th Annual Parish Picnic

08/29/2022

Council: 114 - BANGOR

Project Description:

On June 26th, the Pine Cone Council 114 helped to sponsor the eighth annual parish wide family picnic. Sponsored by the Pastoral Council. The Knights volunteered to grill the hotdogs and cheeseburgers, set up the tables and chairs and finally gave $400 toward the food and supplies for the event. The Pastoral Council also asked if we could have a dunk tank available to help add a new activity. The knights were not able to rent a dunk tank, but they were able to get a volunteer to donate $200 and the knights purchased a dunking station from Amazon that dumps a bucket of water on the volunteer. Father Bruce Siket and Seminarian Matthew Valles volunteered to be in the dunk station. The Knights crew set up the tables, chairs and grill after the after the 8:30 Mass as well as the dunk station.
It was a great start to get everything ready for the 150 parishioners that would join us later that day. The grill was ready to go and Jamie Berube brought a couple canopies to help keep the grill and grillers out of the sun. Keith Forbes filled the propane tanks and he brought his grandson Dillian to help set up the buffet along with Jaimie Sandoval. Several other brothers soon arrived to set up the games, canopy and remaining buffet tables. Each brought something to share whether bottled waters, chips, salads or desserts.
Around 3pm Brother Bill Bennett, lead Grillman, along with Frank Jordan, Jimmy Landers, John Barry and Romeo El Chaer arrived to get the grill ready for our main course. Brothers Jaimie and Jamie moved to the kitchen ready to assemble the hamburgers, cheese burgers and hot dogs so they could be passed to our guests as smooth as possible. The rest of the Knights finished setting up some outside games like pop the balloon, cake walk, rubber ducky and horseshoes as well as got the trash and recycling containers ready.
We were officially started at 4pm but many people arrived around 3:45. We had a good amount of hot dogs and hamburgers ready for that initial rush. The buffet had volunteer servers from all three groups serving baked beans, chips, salads, watermelon, cookies, drinks and other treats. Msgr Dubois, was there for the blessing and a great meal. The crowd was big and as an observer I could tell they were excited to socialize and watch the families in the games. After the first hour, things slowed down at the buffet and we could let the parishioners serve themselves.
The food did not run out so the crowd was encouraged to get seconds and get their fill. In the middle of the event, we asked for everyone attention and Msgr Dubois announced the Brother Keith Forbes received the Pillar Thibideau Award which is awarded each year for outstanding service in our community. The parish couldn’t have picked a better person and brother knight.
Brother Dan Madruson helped run the Dunk Station and it raised over $100 towards next year’s parish picnic. Both Fr. Bruce and Seminarian Matthew were wonderful sports even when the water was really cold. Many other knights participated in the event and helped with the clean-up. The kids had fun playing with each other and playing outside games. The event went by fast and at 6pm we had a great crowd of Knights and other parishioners helping to pick up tables chairs and trash as well as clean up. Brothers Phil, Blake, Andy, Keith Forbes, Ed and Bill joined in the clean up.
We counted about 150 participants and know we had participation from all six churches in our parish.
We cooked around 150 hot dogs and 100 hamburgers, the crowd ate all the beans and salads that were brought. We had a great day, with great friends and church family and can’t wait to continue this event annually.
Respectfully submitted by EJ Hikel