The area around St. Paul’s Episcopal Church was bustling on May 3 as the annual May Luncheon got underway.
The fundraiser involves selling plates of either barbecue or chicken salad, and the work is divided into committees.
“It’s a whole church event,” said Pat Curtis, one of the coordinators of the event. “That’s what makes it so wonderful. Everybody buys their own (ingredients). I’m on the chicken committee, so I bought 40 pounds of chicken and boiled it, pulled it and massaged it until it was in small pieces that you could make the chicken salad with. Usually, the planning that goes into it, we start probably the first of March.”
The committees were divided up at the beginning of April, then by the end of the month, they received the deadlines of when to have the food at the church.
One of the biggest undertakings is the deviled egg committee. This year, the committee made 1,300 deviled eggs for the event.
“On the Sunday and Monday before the event, the egg committee gets together and makes the deviled eggs,” Curtis said.
While the effort was largely undertaken by the older churchgoers, there were still opportunities for the younger ones to get involved as well.
Thomas Scott, 11, had actually helped with the event before, and he returned this year.
“I started with carrying chicken salad and barbeque plates up and down the hall, and then I went to the chicken salad station and started helping there,” Thomas said. “After that, I went to the window and started helping people carry their orders out to their cars. I have very much enjoyed it.”
Where Thomas was a more seasoned helper, Molly Munson, 11, was new to the scene.
“I’ve been a part of St. Paul’s for a little while, but I haven’t been able to do it before,” Munson said. “I started off bringing all of the different plates into the choir room where we were serving out the window to the customers. We were either handing it to them and taking it to their cars, or we were boxing them up and taking what they had and putting it into larger bags and boxes so we could hand them out.”
While the older kids helped with the serving, 7-year-old Tate Scott helped elsewhere.
“I’ve been helping with the chicken salad, putting the eggs on the side and getting crackers and the pickles,” Tate said. “I’ve also been running back and forth to get the chicken salad and the barbeque. We came here at 9 a.m.”
Tate enjoyed the experience and looks forward to helping again in the future.
“I thought it was very fun,” Tate said.
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