| Cottonwood
City Council meets
The St. Mary’s Hospital Mardi Gras event which was held on March 21st was deemed a success. “I have to admit I was a little worried, our ticket sales were a slow at first; just like past years but the week prior to the event they picked up” commented Development Coordinator, Cheri Holthaus. “We had a great crowd; many returning guests and also a lot of new ones.” “The proceeds from this event will go towards the remodeling of our handicap shower” commented Holthaus. “Thanks to the generosity of all those who sponsored the event, purchased tickets, donated and/or purchased auction items we will be able to get this project completed in the very near future. At this point I am not exactly sure how much money we made on this event; I am still waiting on some last minute bills and receipts, but I think we will clear between $18,000 and $20,000.”Committee member Brenda Kaschmitter added “we know how lucky we are here at St. Mary’s Hospital to have such great backing from our community and the surrounding areas…an event of this size would never be able to be achieved if we didn’t have that kind of wonderful support”. The dinner which was catered again this year by Stephanie Duclos from “A Taste of Art” consisted of mixed salad with roasted walnuts and cranberries, bourbon chicken, New Orleans style rice and beans, garlic mashed potatoes, rolls and a variety of cheesecakes. According to several guests, “I have never had chicken that was so tender and juicy, it was delicious.” The hall was decorated in traditional Mardi Gras colors of purple, green and gold with a New Orleans background. The tables had a purple table cloth, cut glass goblets, and gold satin chair covers. “The Mardi Gras committee would like to thank Jeannie Arnzen for altering the chair covers; thanks to her new design of the covers she literally saved us several hours decorating. In the past we had to tie and adjust each cover, this year we just had to slip them on, it was so nice,” said Holthaus. Ben Bross and the B Sides provided music during the social hour and dinner. The Idaho County Royalty greeted guests as they arrived and escorted them to their tables. There was a silent and live auction; auctioneer and emcee; Jim Church kept the crowd engaged while he auctioned off trips, a wine tree, beer barrow, furniture and much more. The silent auction included everything from various college football tickets to fairy gardens to homemade desserts. “The committee would like to extend a special thank you to Jim for keeping the crowd entertained throughout the evening,” Holthaus said. “He honestly is one of the reasons the evening was such a success, he is just a natural entertainer.” “I want to give special thanks to all our donors especially our major donors who contributed towards this event. Our $2,000 donors were Mountain View Dentistry and Palouse Imaging Consultants. The $1,000 donors were St. Joseph Regional Medical, Pathologists’ Regional Lab and Cloninger’s and our $500 donors were Monastery of St. Gertrude, Valley Facial Plastics & ENT, Hillco, Avista and Life Flight,” commented Holthaus. “Their support is greatly appreciated.” “In addition to our sponsors; there are several other people I would like to thank,” commented Holthaus. “Carol Altman, Sam Altman and Kim Miller for helping not only at the registration table but also for helping throughout the evening; plus an extra thank you to Carol Altman for helping with the table decorations. Thank you to the dealers who helped to make the ‘casino’ portion of the evening so enjoyable. I would also like to thank Rod and Donna Quick and their staff for running the bar, they did a great job. And I can’t forget to thank NICI for allowing the offenders to come down and help us set-up and tear-down; I honestly am not sure we would be able to do it without their help.These gentlemen do everything from washing dishes, to hanging decorations to putting up the tables and chairs to folding napkins.” Committee members included Shelli Schumacher, Jessica Enneking, Brenda Kaschmitter, Collette Schaeffer, Tina Fernandez, Karla Enneking, Kathy Seubert, Colleen Sonnen, Tonya Bowman and Natalie Latimer. “All these members worked so hard to make this event a success; they helped get auction items, make table decorations, set up the entertainment, organize volunteers and they spent many hours decorating and cleaning up,” Holthaus commented. “I am not sure I will ever be able to thank them enough for everything they did.” 
A scene from the St. Mary’s Hospital Mardi Gras held Saturday, March 21 at Cottonwood Community Hall. Photo by Cheri Holthaus. |
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