Urgent All Call For August 2nd – We Need All Club Members to Help!
President’s Message:
Hello everyone and happy summer season to you all. As always, I hope that this newsletter finds you all feeling happy, healthy and safe! I’m enjoying it all. We have backyard BBQ’s, block parties, concerts, parks and beaches to have fun with. Family and friends to visit and go out with. Of course, we have our own events to take advantage of at Club Paesano. Some of us are playing bocce, and hopefully all of us will be attending our “Concert in the Park” on Saturday, August 2nd. Whatever you’re up to, have fun and make the most of it all! I’m going back to the Mother Country, Italia, with my folks! I’m looking forward to getting back there with my parents to visit their town, other cities and especially our relatives. In fact, we have already been invited to a wedding. The party’s already starting, LoL! Take care and have fun!
Concert in the Park:
Well, believe it or not, that time of the year is already upon us. It’s “Concert in the Park” TIME! Yes, on Saturday August 2nd we will celebrate our annual summer party! It’s only 2 weeks away. Unlike other years, this will be an all-day event, and an “All Hands-on Deck” event, meaning if you are in town, I’m hoping that you will not only be attending, but also volunteering to pick up a shift or two. There will be plenty of duties to be filled with different time slots. If you would like to have your choice, then I advise you to sign up early. I don’t want to assign you to a position and time, so please volunteer early, by contacting Kelly Barasch @ (971-806-9524) or Daniela Sardo @ (503-310-9127) for volunteer duties and time slots. If you don’t, and you are attending, then I will assign you a spot. I want this to be a fun event for all of us, but in order to do that, we will ALL need to help! Our set-up day will be Friday August 1st starting at 11am. If you are not working during the day or can come out after work and volunteer for a couple of hours to set up tables and chairs, your help will be appreciated. We don’t have enough time to do it Saturday morning because the Farmers Market will be setting up at that time. The day’s events will include our very 1st Farmers Market (being run by Bridget & Micheal Merrill) which will open at 10am and will go through 5pm. If you have something that you would like to sell and would like to rent a booth, please contact Bridget at 971-269-6316 for more information. Once again, our charity partner will be our Filipino friends, “Calabarzon”, which will hold their own mini concert in the lodge from 12pm till 4pm. They’re entertainment will include 3 Filipino singers from Las Vegas. Let’s help our friends out and attend their concert too. The ticket price for their event is $25, and all proceeds will go to their charity “Calabarzon”. They will also sell some of their favorite Filipino food. Their charity raises money to send a group of dentists over to impoverished towns in the Philippines. The dentists care for children at no cost, for those families that can’t otherwise afford it. It’s such a great cause. At 4:30pm, we will open the gates for our “Concert in the Park”! Our famous Spaghetti & meatball dinner will be served at 5:30pm followed by our entertainment. “5 GUYS NAMED MOE” will be taking the stage at 6:30pm and will have you dancing the night away till 10pm. Our party will continue till 11pm or later. This is a “Family Friendly” event, so please bring the children out too. We will have children’s activities at the Farmer’s Market as well.Children’s prices are; 12-6 yrs old – $10 / Children 5 and younger are free! We’ve made it more affordable for our families. There are still plenty of tickets available, so let’s get online and purchase your tickets, to get your favorite seats. As always, please invite family, friends, co-workers and the general public. This event is open to all! Let’s all do a last-minute push to get more tickets sold! Let’s make it a “Sell-out” and have a whole lot of fun! Go to www.paesanoclub.org to purchase your tickets now.
Paesano Bocce Club:
Paesano Bocce Club is rolling along! We are 2 weeks away from our playoffs followed by our Championship Sunday on August 10th. It’s so hard to believe that we are already so far along in our leagues. I guess it’s like we all say, “Time flies when you are having fun!”. It has been a very fun yet competitive season. All of our members are having a great time and have been spreading the word. We have received so much interest from new people that have either been recruited by our current members or have just looked us up. They are interested in playing bocce and heard that we are the best place to play. Well, I’ll 2nd that! If you are not playing yet, what are you waiting for? If you have any interest at all, please come out to watch or arrange a date with one of our board members to meet at the courts to learn more about the game and to roll a few balls. Our board members, Mario Pompei, Doug Burchak, Kelly & Paul Barasch, Lori DeMaestri or myself, will be happy to help you with that. On the weekend of July 12th and 13th, we held our biggest tournament of the year, our “Aldo Rossi” Tournament. As always it was a great success! We had teams that came in from California and Washington. All the teams loved it and are already making their plans to come back. In fact, they want to bring others from their states. That’s awesome! We had 2 days of very good competition and tough play. I’m glad to report back that our Paesano bocce club faired very well and am very proud to say that “Pallino or Bust”, the team that I play for, took 1st place overall. The team consisting of Brad Cotton, Betty Hansen, Joachim Creten and myself. We had to work extra hard, going through the loser’s bracket to get to the finals. All of the games were close, but at the end, we were victorious! There are so many people to thank that made this whole tournament run smooth. 1st of all, I’d like to thank our very own, Joe and Nick Rossi. They both stepped up and sponsored us with great funding to make this a great event! We were able to provide more prize money and pay for more places finished. We were also able to provide our players with breakfast, lunch and beverages and a huge Saturday night dinner, which everyone complimented. I’d like to thank our President, Mario Pompei, for putting his playing aside and ran the tournament. It was smooth and went off without a hitch. All our games were done quickly and were on track. Thank you for that! I’d like to thank the rest of the board for all that was done to make this tournament fantastic. Doug Burchak, Kelly & Paul Barasch, Lori DeMaestri and myself. We had months of planning, and we made it happen. I’d also love to thank our non-players and non-members that helped with food and serving. Jimmy Calcagno, Jim Burch, Debbie Calcagno, Jayne Pompei, Lynn Piraino, Diane Cervi, Jim Barnes, Mario Mastrangelo and Shawn Cage. To all the team members that came in to help set up and tear down too. If I’ve missed anyone, please forgive me. You are all appreciated so much! As you all know, Paesano Bocce is working hard to raise funds to put a roof over our beautiful courts. Doing so will promote more bocce in our area making the PBC the biggest and best place to play in the PNW! To do this, we need to raise a lot. If you are able to help us and donate funding, we are now a 501-C3. Your donations can be written off on your taxes. We will provide you with a receipt. Please reach out to our board of directors for more information. We also have Signs, for advertising or family, banners to place on our fence that faces the Spring Water trail (Great advertising location), personal pavers that are installed around our courts and tons of “Swag”. All proceeds from these sales will be put towards building our roof. If you own a company or work for a company that can sponsor our league or a tournament, we’d love that too! If you’d like a chance to play, or learn how to play, we will start our “Fall League” on Sunday September 7th at 8am. This is a great chance for you to play with other members of all experience levels. For $25, we start playing on the 7th and play till “Mother Nature” stops us because of the weather. Last year we played for 8 weeks. $25 for 8 weeks? What a deal. Whether you are new to the game or a seasoned vet, everyone is welcomed. Play starts at 9am and finishes at noon. You still have time to take advantage of the day! Please go to our website at www.paesanobocceclub.com for more information and to sign up for this and for anything else that’s bocce related. See you on the courts!
Club Paesano Dues:
Our CP dues for 2025 are due on June 1st. Please contact our treasurer, John Kern to make arrangements for payments. Also please take care of any past payments of dues or dance tickets that you may still owe from our past events and 2024. Please take care of it sooner than later so John doesn’t have to chase you. John is a very busy man so let’s make it easy for him!
Cedarville Lodge & Park Rentals:
If you or someone you know are in need of a beautiful venue to rent for an event, please think Cedarville Lodge first. The club’s bookings are finally starting to pick up again, after this pandemic, but we can still use a little help. Please contact our Venue Director, Maria Duong, at 503-577- 8471 and she will be more than helpful and gracious in getting you all the info that you may need, and to also help you with coordinating your event.
Cedarville Park Shares:
Need a good reason to purchase Cedarville Shares? Get Astronomical savings on Park Rentals and save Thousands!
If you are interested in owning a piece of this fantastic place and would like to purchase shares, please contact Steve Petruzelli at 503-620-3447 or email him at sdpetruzelli@comcast.net .
Thoughts and Prayers:
It is with a very heavy heart that I announce the passing of one of Club Paesano’s best, Carlos Barajas. Carlos was fit and full of energy, so it was such a surprise to hear about it. I’m still trying to wrap my thoughts around it. Carlos was not only a great member, but a fantastic person. He was always willing to help out, whether it was for the club’s needs or if you needed help in your personal life. So many times, he would tell me that if I needed any help with a project, to call him. He was such a talented man that could do it all! Carlos had just returned from Las Vegas helping his daughter with a renovation to her home. A few months ago, he had to do a huge renovation to his own home. At our last meeting, he made sure to help me set up and said that he would be available to help all day at our upcoming Concert because this was the 1st year that he wasn’t running in the Hood to Coast race. What a man! He gave me a bottle of wine out of his own collection and told me to bring it home and enjoy it with my family. I wanted to open it, but he said no, you need to take it home! He was so kind and always thinking of others! Like most, I considered Carlos a great person and a great friend! You will truly be missed, my friend. Rest in Peace. Carlos is survived by his loving wife, Maura (Potestio) and his children. Carlos married Maura and into the Potestio family. Our condolences go out to his family and to the Potestio’s. Phil, Micheal, Mike, Rick, Bill. I know that this is a huge loss and just know that your CP Famiglia is here for you all. The family is planning a Celebration of life near the end of August. We will make sure you all know when we have more details. Godspeed our friend!
La Carota Question:
Congratulations go out to Chris Siri for June’s bottle and Jim Burch for July’s. Jimmy was a one man show for July’s question, so the competition was slim, lol! It just goes to prove once again that you can’t win if you don’t play! This month’s question will be a fun one. I’m going to name a few Italians that changed their names when they became famous. I will give you their names beforehand and you will give me their celebrity names.
1. Rodolfo Alfonso Raffaello Pierre Filbert Guglielmi di Valentina d’Antonguolla
3. Steven VictorTallarico
4. Randle Poffo
5. Mark Sinclair
6. Ashley Nicolette Frangipane
That’s it. Give me these Italians “Celebrity” names to win this month’s bottle of Vino. Let’s get some new winners! All correct answers will be entered to win. Good Luck!
Final Thoughts:
When I found out about the passing of Carlos, it again showed me how fragile life can be. We tend to only think about the old and weak that can pass away. We never think about the strong and young. In an instance it can be taken away. Carlos was young and strong and had a zest for life. His smile would brighten the room, and his character was compassion and love. He was a genuine person with integrity and constitution. He will be truly missed by all! We all tend to have moments that fill us with dislike, disdain, jealousy, feeling down, or sorry for ourselves. We hold resentment and grudges. We all need to pick ourselves up and remember that all of this can be taken away from us in the blink of an eye. One day you are here enjoying life, and the next you could be gone. Not only you, but a loved one. This is not a message to depress, but to evaluate and think about how precious life truly is, and to make the best of what we have. Sometimes we just need to drop the negative and think about the positive. Let’s make the best of the great times and the great people that surround us. I personally enjoy my family and will make the most of my time in Italy with my parents. Say I love you and don’t go to bed angry. Trust me, I’ve been told this so many times. I know that you all know it too and don’t need to hear it from me, but I’ll say it anyway. Enjoy what you have, and let’s also love and enjoy our CP family. Make the best of our club and your fellow members! Here’s a salute for Carlos and to all of you. Live long and prosper! Ecco a 100 anni! Rick
P.S. Due to my vacation next month, there will be no September newsletter. You may receive a slimmed down version from Debbie Calcagno Guthrie if she chooses to write one. Thanks
Rick