Chicken Soup Anyone?

I always knew that big chicken costume I bought at a junk store in Mesa, Arizona would come in handy someday!
Charley D. Chicken and his little "chickies" (not exactly the kind of "chicks" Bryce wishes would follow him around!) What a good sport that boy of mine is!
I didn't know there were so many viarieties of Chicken Soup but trust the members of the Aopka Ward to come up with a Chicken Soup Feast!
This was the author's chair and the completed product on display.
What a sweet surprise! I hate birthday's! I don't know why. I just don't like being the center of attention but everyone at the activity was sure glad my friends Terry and Joe Trombley honored me with a delicious and beautiful surprise birthday!

Thanks to the help and support of wonderful ward members, we can chalk up another successful Ward Activity. Last night we had our very first "Chicken Soup for the Apopka Ward Soul" night. For about 2 months I have collected personal stories from the members and edited and compiled them into a book for members to check-out from the ward library. An artist in our ward created a beautiful cover for the book! Everyone brought a pot of their favorite chicken soup for dinner. The ward supplied rolls and green salad. A good friend anonymously donated ice cream for dessert and the Trombley's surprised us with a birthday cake in my honor. Dinner was great but the highlight of the evening was the program. The book is divided into 7 sections and one author from each section favored us with a reading of their own story. It was wonderful. Gary was Mr. Musac and music faded in and out with each introduction. At the beginning of the program Charley Chicken gave a certificate for a free chicken Biscuit from Chick-fil-A to each person who submitted a story. We only had about 70 people, down from our usual 120-150, but lots of things were going on so we were grateful for the 70 who came. Those on the committee decided there's a bright side to having a smaller turn-out-----less chaos! And oh yes, that's newpaper pretending to be tablecloths. We loved that part of the clean-up. Each centerpeice carried out the chicken theme so we decided casual called for newspapers instead of linens! Everyone agreed they looked great!