Labor of Love Open House

A Labor of Love

Afterburners Open House Meeting on August 30, 2016, was a grand success!  In fact, we earned a Golden Gavel ribbon for the great number of members present, many special guests, no changes to the agenda, and we began and ended on time!  PLUS......we had a special array of FOOD!  Toastmasters meetings don't get any better than that!

To our delight, special guests Veronica Sites (left), District 25 Representative, and International Director David McCallister (center) pushed the greatness of our meeting off the charts!  They are pictured above with President Setma Maddox (right).   Additionally, Afterburners is the home club to three Area Directors — Area 11 Director, Holly Trinh; Area 13 Director, Aileen Hummel; and Area 24 Director, Kim Story — all present at our Open House.

To add to the excitement, our best speaker was Verlin Yoder (right) delivering his 2nd speech from the Competent Communication manual.  Verlin cleverly relayed his SMART goals using the analogy of entering the "Hotten than Hell" bike race of 100 miles in Wichita Falls.  He is pictured here with Best Evaluator Jim Hummel, and winner of Table Topics Antoinette Silas.

Our efforts paid off too as we garnered a couple of new members in the process!  All told, we can agree that being a Toastmaster is truly a Labor of Love.  You may view more photos here.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year!

Afterburners Club Toastmasters begins new year July 1, 2016

Afterburners held their first meeting for the new year Tuesday, July 5.  For a day after a holiday, we certainly had an energetic group with 15 members present and 6 guests!  New officers were 'fired up' and President Setma Maddox is ready to take the baton to lead us through another great year for our members.  As a matter of fact, Setma was our 3rd speaker with "A New Beginning," from Project 2 in Advanced Manual Specialty Speeches, Uplift the Spirit.  In her presentation, Setma cleverly conveyed the framework of how Toastmasters works using the inverted pyramid with the top spot being YOU, the member.  All other layers of the pyramid, the Club, the Area, Division, District, Region, and International hold UP the member in service.  Not only was her timely presentation impressionable to new members, it reminded all of us veterans of how we can step in to serve our fellow members by being a mentor, communicating outside our Club, and serving the District in many capacities.  Good work, Setma for setting the tone for the coming year!

New member, Marah Nelson, earned the Best Speaker ribbon for her presentation "Be a Guardian Angel." Using Project #3 from Competent Communication manual, Get to the Point, Marah engaged the audience quickly by demonstrating how we can be a guardian angel and save a life using CPR.  She encouraged us all to learn CPR, especially during the summer months when the incidents of drowning increases.  Complete with informative handouts and her beautiful smile, Marah is an angel for reminding us to be vigilant and care for our neighbors.

Aileen Hummel sold the audience with "Evidence-based Minimally Invasive Extraction Methods," from the Advanced Specialty Speeches manual, Project 3, Sell a Product.  Aileen was assiduously (WOD) shared the new inventive techniques for dentists to use to help them extract a tooth in less than 2 minutes with minimal pain!  Now that takes a bite out of the fears and phobias of going to the dentist!

Rose Timmons was Table Topics Master utilizing our theme of the New Year and Nick Craven (new member voted in that night!) took the ribbon for Best Table Topics speaker as he enthusiastically explained his desire to become a motivational speaker, with the help of Toastmasters!  Dan Chisum earned the ribbon for Best Evaluator evaluating Setma and encouraging new growth — even for a Distinguished Toastmaster.

What a fantastic meeting and boost for the New Year!  Let us know how you feel about it!