Women in the Tellico Village HomeOwners Association Ladies Lite Luncheon kicked off the new year in a grand way this past week with a fashion show led by Good Neighbors Shoppe volunteers, a bake sale that went toward charity, interior design talk from guest speaker Margaret Boyes and musical entertainment by pianist Linda Schuessler.
About 90 women dined in the Yacht Club. Proceeds from the bake sale, which consisted of an assortment of cupcakes, raised $224 for St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, Sam McQueeney, luncheon co-chairwoman, said. The $224 was the highest amount the luncheon has raised since the event returned from its break in September 2014, she said. Luncheons are held September-May.
“First of all we are providing a dessert to go with our luncheon’s meal,” Elaine Sepaniak, luncheon bake sale coordinator, said as she placed cupcakes on the table for sale. “We work to try to keep the costs down, and one of the big costs is the dessert. They have wonderful desserts here, and at first we thought, ‘Well, let’s just don’t have dessert,’ and we had people standing up and complaining. ... If they want a dessert, they can buy it. It’s reasonable, $3. That’s very reasonable.”
Ladies are asked to volunteer their time baking each month. In return, volunteers get the opportunity to pick which charities they wish to support, McQueeney said. Proceeds from previous sales have gone to the Loudon County Animal Shelter, Four Paws Food Pantry and the American Legion. Next month, proceeds are scheduled to go to Alzheimer’s Tennessee.
Good Neighbors Shoppe co-founder Roberta Burwell and a few other store volunteers were on hand to hold the luncheon’s fashion show. One by one, show moderator and fellow volunteer Dee Steimer introduced each model, sporting a number of clothing outfits in front of the women in attendance.
“We’ve enjoyed it so much,” Burwell said. “We have fun, and they have fun, and we have some beautiful clothes. ... It’s all for sale. When she tells them the price, and we have sold them right afterwards. So the prices are there. They can purchase them here or then we take them to the store if they want to come to the store. We’ve sold a lot of them right off of us. I sold a fur coat right off of me.”
Guest speaker Boyes talked about ways to liven up houses after removing Christmas decorations.
Attendance was down from recent luncheons, luncheon officials said, but McQueeney said she thought that was because some of the women may still be out of town.
“For January, I think the luncheon went very well, a lot of the ladies are away for the winter, but we had a good turnout anyways, and everyone loved seeing the Good Neighbor (sic) Shoppe,” McQueeney said in an email correspondence.
McQueeney and fellow chairwoman Karen Sue Keith took over organizing the luncheon in September, and they tweaked the format a little bit that now includes starting the event earlier, offering a monthly bake sale for charity, holding at least two vendors per luncheon and providing musical entertainment or a guest speaker. The two women took over for longtime coordinator Jane Venable after she retired.
McQueeney said the new additions have “breathed new life” into the event.
“The changes have been very positive,” McQueeney said. “People have — like I said, and not that Jane was doing anything wrong, it’s just that she had been doing it for 22 years, and it got smaller and smaller and smaller. I mean there was a time that you couldn’t get in here, you know, in the beginning, and then it got smaller and smaller as people passed or decided they did it for years and (said) ‘I’m not doing it anymore.’”
Now that the Ladies have gotten used to the new format, McQueeney said the next step will be to continually fine tune the luncheon to ensure people still get enjoyment out of it.
“So, next year it’s more of, OK, now we’re going to start planning next year on who we’re going to ask to be speakers, and we’ve got a couple things that we’re thinking of, but I think this format is working, you know, coming in earlier, having vendors, having a speaker-entertainment is being very well received,” McQueeney said.
Signups are accepted up until noon the Wednesday before the luncheon. Reservations can be made at the Yacht Club, New Villager socials and HOA social events.
The cost per person is $15. Only checks are accepted, and they can be made out to “Tellico Village Yacht Club.” Ladies Lite Luncheons are held September through May.
For more information, call McQueeney at 865-657-9020 or email samnskip@charter.net or Keith at 865-458-4277 or email kskeith1@icloud.com.
