July 22,2020 Your Source for Livonia Happenings

Shave your head for pediatric cancer.
The St. Baldrick's event is back on. Set for August 30.
Matthew Kulacki , pictured left with Laura Toy shaving his head in 2019, the co-chair of the 2020 St. Baldricks shave for pediatric cancer dropped a dime to fill us all in on the plans for the long put off event, thanks to the pandemic, 2020 event.

I think we can all agree that this has been one awkward, at times frustrating, scary, crazy, enlightening year, huh!?!?

But as they say THE SHOW MUST GO ON!!

We, as your event staff, had a meeting with the powers that be at One Under last week. YOUR METRO DETROIT ST BALDRICKS EVENT IS A GO FOR AUGUST 30TH!

From noon -- 5pm on Aug 30th we will take over the One Under Bar with our own personal style of organized insanity. Myself and Robb (aka captain Shamrock) will be on the mic, as always. Your St Baldrick s volunteer staff will be doing their thing. And all of you will hopefully be able to join us.

This might take some organization. So plan on me reaching out a few times over the next month and a half. We are working on figuring out the new capacity for the bar as they work towards re-opening. This will dictate how many people we can have in the bar at one time as we have to still stay at half capacity. So we very well may need to organize a 12-230 window and a 230-5 window to assure we don t blow the roof off that brand new space with all of our amazingness! I know how you guys roll!

So, with that all being said, things will be a little different. We will all have to chip in and do our part to keep ourselves as well as all other around us safe. There will be mask rules.

Keep in mind what we are doing here. It is a pediatric cancer fundraiser. So many participants very well may have someone with a compromised immune system. We will be doing all in our power to make sure this is a smooth and safe event! We will be working diligently with One Under management and staff over the next 6 weeks to ensure a safe and fun environment. We want you all to feel comfortable showing up. If you are not comfortable for any reason We will not judge! Get in touch with Myself of Robb and we can facilitate a Drive-By Shaving of sorts and still make it the magical experience that it should be!

Stay tuned for more updates. But until then, KEEP UP THE AMAZING WORK! We are less then $2500 from hitting $100K for the year. So I hope/expect that we should be able to smash that goal and still have one of our best years yet! This is our 10th anniversary after all! A DECADE OF GREATNESS! Can you believe our little event has been around for a decade!?

Thank you to all that have done and continued to do your part this year. With most of this year s events being cancelled this year, we are the shining light for St Baldrick s. Thank you to all of our participants, fundraisers, supporters and sponsors from the bottom of all our hearts for sticking with us through these tough times.

On behalf of your 2020 Metro Detroit Saint Baldrick s Event Staff, thank you and we love you all.

See you all on August 30th at the One Under, Five Mile.
To make a donation or to check up on some of your neighbors who are a part of the team and have already started collected donations. People like Livonia Jaycees, Steve Waligora , Brandon Grysko , Amanda Walworth , Douglas McClain , Susan Rhoton and dozens, that's right, dozens more. Click here to check them our and maybe, just maybe make a donation yourself:



Commentary: Another one bites the dust. Thanks pandemic! But we are going to beat you and come out stronger than ever. But first. . .

I am here to invite you to reminisce. I am here to invite you to help prepare. No, actually I am here to invite. . .I think it will work better if I combine the three and invite you to reminisce about Corn Roast 1, Corn Roast 2 and Corn Roast 3 while we prepare for Corn Roast 4 and invite you. . .in September 2021.

Year 1 had over 600 or so people. Beautiful weather. 25 community organizations.

Year 2 had over 1000 or so people. Gorgeous weather. 31 community organizations.

Year 3. . .we had fun with 34 community organizations, some pictured above at the Lions Corn Roasting station and rain. Lots of it half way through the picnic. But we had fun.
Year 4 was going to expand. On Saturday teams of Livonia volunteers, two students along with two service club members, would knock on pan doors, hopefully 5,000, doors behind which would be new residents who moved into Livonia in 2020. They were to welcome them to the community while handing them special invitation about their new hometown. Information on service clubs, cultural organizations and events, history of Livonia and information about the city.

Yep, we were going to recruit 500 volunteers set up in teams of 4-5. They would knock on 50 doors each. 100 teams X 50 homes. 5,000. With invitations left behind inviting them to the Good Old-fashioned Neighborhood Corn Roast the next day.

That's right we would knock doors on Saturday from 10 - 1. At one o'clock all the volunteers would be treated to hot dogs and soda pop served up by . . .well we had not gotten that far. But we do know that we were shooting for 40 organizations on Sunday and 1,500 ears of corn and 2,000 attendees at the Corn Roast.
So now we have a year to organize and make it one barn burner of a Livonia Homecoming Weekend. Knock doors on Saturday. Corn Roast on Sunday with invitations to former residents to come on back to Michigan and to their hometown. You know people like. . .well let's just suffice it to say we will invite authors, hollywood types, Broadway folks, artists. You get the hint.

So maybe, just maybe we can pull this off if we have a year to pull it together. It goes against my template that good events require no more than 3 months, no more than one meeting, and lots of phone calls. Let's see.