The following people are the first new members of the class of 2024:
Daylene Bennett
Cindy & Brad Buggs
Peggy Crowfoot
Paula Jaklitsch & Hope Flack
Steven & Patricia Keller
Linda & Bob Kingswood
Curt & Debbie Lanham
George Perry & Donna McDonnall
Rocky & Kelly Nohl
John & Linda Schakenbach
Susan Shipman
Mike & Cindy Vanek
Cindy Yeast
Welcome to the Club!
Learn From A Pro: Turning That Simple Dish Into A Spectacular Meal
For the very first time, Newcomers is bringing you a special event featuring our very own in-house chef - Lance Foss. Lance will be sharing some of his culinary skills through a pair of cooking classes. During each class, he plans to prepare an appetizer of prosciutto-wrapped asparagus in puff pastry, followed by a main course of bison bolognese.
Both classes take place on Thursday, February 21st, with the first being 1:00‑3:00pm and the second being 3:30‑5:30pm. The classes will be held at the Unruh home, 1070 Elk Trail Court.
Lance is a 1979 graduate of Johnson and Wales University with a degree in Culinary Arts. He spent most of his career in Old Orchard Beach Maine and retired as the Executive Chef of Express Events in Saco, Maine. Lance specialized in simple dishes prepared with high quality ingredients and his motto was, “Buy really good ingredients, and try not to screw them up.”
We hope you’ll join us for an afternoon of good food and entertainment. The cost is $10pp, and you are encouraged to bring your own wine if you so desire.
Please join your fellow Newcomer friends for the next General Meeting on Wednesday, February 20 at the Rock Inn. Following our cocktail hour and dinner, we will enjoy hearing from local historian and naturalist Bruce Davies.
Bruce has produced his fifth recorded presentation specifically for this Newcomers meeting. It will prove to be one his most fascinating accounts as he details the lives of the wonderful people who created the lodging industry in Estes and Rocky Mountain National Park. Using historical photographs as well as some of his own photography, Bruce will weave a story that is at once interesting and inspiring as well as lighthearted and uplifting.
After constructing a modest homestead cabin, Abner Sprague decided to go into the resort business leading up to the construction of this three-story log hotel.
(Courtesy of Rocky Mountain National Park)
Bruce moved to Estes Park in 2009 and later took a position as concierge for The Historic Stanley hotel. While working there, he discovered his passion in the wonderful history of the area. Bruce became involved with the Estes Park Museum, first as a docent doing historical walking tours of the downtown area, and later serving on the Museum Friends board of directors. After people asked if he could take them to places he was talking about, Bruce decided in 2014 to start his own private tour company, Tour Estes Park. He has taken hundreds of visitors on historical expeditions into Rocky Mountain National Park and the Estes valley. Bruce also does a weekly talk at Rams Horn Village and has been a featured presenter at Baldpate Inn's Summer Enchanted Evening. When he is not traveling the country or conducting tours, Bruce can be found in the National Forest or around Lake Estes with his wife Sarah, walking their dog Raven.
Registration is required for this event, so to learn more and secure your spot, use the button below.
Welcome to Tech Tips! In this monthly series, our Tech Ops team will share simple tips and techniques to help you get the most out of the Club's technology resources.
Joining Interest Groups Online
Newcomers Club members have the opportunity to join other members in a wide selection of small group activities called Interest Groups. A listing of the Interest Groups can be found on the main Interest Group page. From there, simply click or tap on the photo or the group name to see more details about a particular group.
Note: In order to sign up for an Interest Group, you will need to be signed in to the website with your member account.
Once you're signed in, choose the desired group from the main Interest Group page. Towards the bottom, you will see a Join This Group button.
After you click the button, you will be asked to confirm your Gmail account (or enter a non-Google email address). Once you have completed that, you should receive email confirming that you have joined the group.
Participating In Interest Groups
Once you have joined, you should start receiving email notices from the group's leaders about upcoming gatherings.
You can reply to either the group leader, or reply-to-all for the entire group.
If you check the Club calendar, you will see scheduled Interest Group gatherings. Clicking any of those events, you will see the meeting time and place, along with additional info about that gathering.
If you decide to leave an Interest Group, simply unsubscribe from any email notice you receive. That notifies the leader, and removes you from their email distribution list automatically.
If you have any questions, contact tech@estesparknewcomers.org.
At a ceremony held on January 17, the Trail Ridge Quilters presented a check for $11,000 to the Estes Park Health Foundation. As an Interest Group sponsored by the Estes Park Newcomers Club, this tireless group of quilters create and sell items each year to raise funds in support of the hospital Foundation. The Trail Ridge Quilters and Estes Park Newcomers are pleased to help our friends and neighbors in the community this way.
This year’s donation will be utilized to purchase items requested by six departments to directly improve patient care at Estes Park Health: Home Care, Rehab Therapy, Diagnostic Imaging, Emergency Department, EMS/paramedics, and the Birth Center. In addition to the departmental requests, a portion of the funds are designated for the Emergency Capacity Campaign now underway at the Estes Park Health Foundation.
Pictured: (left to right) Diane Scruton (Foundation), Stan Osborne (Foundation), Pam Standard (Quilters), Donna Pierce (Quilters), Kevin L. Mullins (Executive Director, EP Health Foundation), Donna Bryson (Quilters), Rod Unruh (Foundation), Jeanne Allen (Quilters), Joanie Jonell (Quilters) and Ken Zornes (Foundation).
The 80s blockbuster movie trilogy Back To The Future is one of my all-time favorites. It was great fun watching Marty and Doc haplessly bouncing back and forth in time trying to set everything back to normal after accidentally disturbing the timeline.
That movie title came to me as I thought about the many things going on with Newcomers Club this year.
Exploring the past and the future is what our upcoming meeting programs are all about. We’ll bounce from an educational look at the historic lodges in the local area, to a peek into the future through the eyes of several non-profits working in our midst. Not to mention getting a first-person account by one of the astronauts who deployed the Hubble space telescope - arguably the most powerful tool ever created to explore the past and future of the cosmos.
Our hard-working venues team is another example. Though they are well-schooled in the workings of past Newcomers events, they are taking a fresh look at the future. With general meeting attendance growing much faster than anticipated, we must adapt and try new things. The January meeting format is one example of forward-looking planning - creating new ways to host and engage larger groups.
And speaking of the future - the Newcomers Bylaws Review Committee is taking a deep dive into the inner workings of the Club - learning from proven successes of the past, while anticipating future needs. How does our little social club best operate with the growth we have seen these past couple of years? How can Newcomers programming best support the ever-expanding appetite for events and activities of our growing membership? How can we best ensure that the Club stays strong? What lessons from the past can help us?
If Doc would just loan me that Delorean, I could take a peek at the future and report back to you how this all turns out! I definitely want to find out what the heck happened to those flying cars we were supposed to have in 2015.
In the meantime, I will just enjoy Newcomers back here in good ole 2019.
Please join the next General Meeting on January 17th at Latitude 105 (within the Ridgeline Hotel), where we will welcome everyone back from their holiday excursions and activities!
For this meeting we are experimenting with a new format that allows us to accommodate more members and provide better opportunities for socializing. Let us know what you think!
Reception
We'll start the evening in the Latitude 105 bar and dining room at 5pm. You can order your choice of beverage from the bar while enjoying a buffet of their delicious bar food. Latitude 105 provides lots of space to circulate with a mix of high top tables, casual seating, and dining tables, so that we can readily enjoy each other's fellowship.
Program
Following the reception, we will move to the hotel's theater space. The program includes a special speaker - retired NASA astronaut (and Newcomers alumnus) Loren Shriver.
Following his distinquished Air Force career, Loren became a Space Shuttle Pilot Astronaut and flew three Space Shuttle Missions - STS 51-C in 1985, STS 31 in 1990, and STS 46 in 1992. In 1993 he retired from the Air Force, completed his service as an Astronaut, and entered Civil Service with NASA.
He held Operations Management positions in the Space Shuttle Program Office and was Deputy Center Director for Launch and Payload Processing at the Kennedy Space Center.
Registration
Registration is required for this event, so to learn more and secure your spot, use the button below.
Cost is $24 per person. You are encouraged to pay online by credit card, but you can elect to pay with cash or check at the event. Credit cards are not accepted at the event.
CANCELLATION POLICY: The deadline to cancel your registration is Thursday January 10, and you must send an email to registration@estesparknewcomers.org.
If the first time you ever played poker was in a casino with a bunch of skilled veterans, chances are that you did not have a good time. A much more enjoyable alternative is to play in a relaxed, social environment where everyone is there to just have fun. That's what the Men's Poker interest group is all about.
We are a really fun group of members, alumni, and even a few folks from the community. According to Newcomers alumnus and Men's Poker coordinator Scott Thompson, "We play dealer's choice, and the games range from Five Card Draw to Super Omaha, and all games in between. Betting is nickel/dime/quarter a maximum and raise limits. It’s a $5 buy-in, where a big winner would make $8, and the big loser about the same."
The group plays on the 3rd Wednesday of each month, year-round, rotating between member homes. The host provides a meal and beverages. Come join a lively game of Men's Poker!
You can learn more about this interest group and sign up for Men's Poker here.
Welcome to Tech Tips! In this monthly series, our Tech Ops team will share simple tips and techniques to help you get the most out of the Club's technology resources.
Using the Member Directory
To view the online member directory, click OUR MEMBERS in the top menu (after signing in). Enter a first or last name (or the first few letters) in the search bar above the map, and then click SEARCH.
The matching members' names and addresses are listed below the map. You can click on a member in the search results list to see more details, including phone numbers and a link to send them an email message.
Matching members are also indicated by pins on the map. If you click on a pin, you will see their name (and maybe a photo). If you then click on the name, you will see more details.
You can also use the Download Member Directory button in the upper right corner to obtain a PDF file containing all active members' contact information, including email addresses.
If you search the directory on a phone or tablet, you can use the view larger map link to get to a full size map where you can get driving directions and other information.
As you might notice, some of the directory entries include members' pictures. This is quite helpful in matching up names and faces. You can easily add a photo to your directory entry by going to the ABOUT YOU page, clicking the Directory tab, and following the directions in the Directory Photo box.
If you have any questions, contact tech@estesparknewcomers.org.