At the Happy Hands luncheon, we had 32 people. Of these, seven were visitors. Nancy Rarus, HH Chair, started the meeting @ 11:30AM. Carolyn Willis, coordinator of the Sunshine Committee, gave updates on Elizabeth Allen and Annie Dickens. Kenny Hynes, (coordinator of the Activities Committee) and Jill Moebus explained about the "Pearl Harbor" program after luncheon on December 7th. Kenny also explained about the "White Elephant" Gift Exchange which would be after the "Pearl Harbor" program.

Nancy announced that of those in the list for November birthdays, only one was present -- that was Elaine Shaffer. She was honored by being the first one in the buffet line. The main dish on the buffet table was smoked turkey from Harris Teeter. The door Prize winner was Dora Ing (we had to guess a number that Nancy was thinking of). The 50/50 Raffle winner was Mary Jane Jones.

Joe Cohen mentioned that banks were now abandoning plans to charge fees for using debit cards for purchases. He advised that we all check our bank statements to make sure those fees were not there. If yes, we can contact banks to have them waived.

Shirley Desrosier described activities of the senior citizens in Newington, Connecticut and the Bay State senior organization. In Connecticut, they meet every Tuesday. In Western Massachusetts (Longmeadow), they meet monthly. They also take advantage of workshops and field trips provided by the Senior Community Center with interpreters made available through a grant.

Mary Bagby talked about researching resources for "Health and Safety" presentations for Happy Hands.  The major topics identified for this year were "exercise for the home-bound" and "Fall Prevention."  She hoped to find a speaker for "fall prevention" to come this winter (January, February, or March), with a back-up date in case we needed to cancel to prevent weather-related falls. One interesting possibility for future development that she found  was the "Congregational Health Partnership" project of the Inova Hospital System.   This program worked with congregations and nonprofits  to develop "health ministries."  Their primary focus was helping to develop programs to enhance the health of linguistic and cultural minority groups. They had already given Mary suggestions for possible contacts to find a speaker on "Fall Prevention."   Early in 2012 Mary would like to meet with the lady who coordinated this project  to discuss possible ways Happy Hands could utilize their support to develop some "Health & Safety" programs. 

Activity for that day was "Chair Yoga". Nancy showed clips from DVD from Chair Dancing International Inc. For information about this particular DVD, see: http://www.chairdancing.com/products/Chair-Yoga™.html. For ordering information, see: http://www.chairdancing.com, or write to: 2658 Del Mar Heights Road, Del Mar, CA 92014.