Welcome to the December 2025 edition of our Council newsletter!

As usual, here are a few quick but important items up-front before we get into the news.

• Our next regular business meeting will be Wednesday, December 10th, starting at 7:30 p.m. All members are welcome. We'll be serving dinner for members around 6:30 for only $5.

• This Saturday, December 6th, is full of holiday events at and around our Council: Our Christmas Village, Kids' Christmas Party, St. James Christmas Bazaar, Holiday on the Lake, Parade of Lights, etc. See the items and flyers below for full details.

• Volunteers are needed on Thursday, Dec. 11th, to deliver food supplies to Putnam C.A.P. Meet at 10:15 a.m. at the Putnam County garage located at 526 Gage Road in Brewster (near Donasburg Rd.) to help transfer the food between trucks. Then proceed to C.A.P. (121 Main Street in Brewster) to unload the food there. Please contact Denis Hanrahan or Pat Barry if you are able to help. Please see our June 2025 newsletter ("Volunteers for Putnam C.A.P. Needed") for full details on this volunteer opportunity.

• Our Christmas Party for adults is Saturday, December 20th, starting at 6:00 p.m. in our Council Hall. Please see the item below for details - and join us!

• Thanks to all of our members and Ladies Auxiliary who turned out on Tuesday, December 2nd, as we joined with KofC councils around the nation to "Light Up for Christ." The tree lighting was preceded by caroling around the tree and was once again led by our own DGK John Crecco on the guitar. A fine time was had by one and all!

So Many Christmas Festivites in Carmel on Sat. Dec. 6th!

It's the most wonderful time of the year!

Here's the run down on the many fun holiday events taking place in Carmel on Saturday, December 6th! See the flyers below for more information.

• Start your day off with breakfast and some Christmas shopping at the St. James Parish Annual Christmas Bazaar in the school gym from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.



• Our Ladies Auxiliary is hosting their fifth "Our Christmas Village"! There's loads of fun for the whole family inside our Council Hall starting with "Kids' Candy Bingo" (2:30 p.m. sharp; 1 full size candy bar per game is your admission); "Story Time / Cookies and Milk with Santa" (3:15 p.m. sharp); and there will be kids' crafts and an area for photos with Santa & Mrs. Claus. Visit more than 55 high-quality vendors in the huge, outdoor holiday market, and enjoy the offerings from the Hudson Valley's finest food trucks, all in the county parking lot behind our building, until 9 p.m. Bring the whole family!

• Our Council will once again provide a free Children's Christmas Party with dinner for our members' families starting at 4:30 p.m. Adults will enjoy a pot-luck dinner, so please bring a dish for the community table. Santa will be attending, so please bring a gift (value $20) for each child you bring, for Santa to distribute. RSVP to Grand Knight Rick or Anthony Falco by email or call/text (914) 450-4475 if you are attending.

• Starting at 5:45 p.m. on Saturday, we will make our way over to the Paladin Center parking lot to line up for the Parade of Lights (steps off at 6:30), with our very own parade float. We need marchers! Come and march behind our Council banner and with our float! We'll once again be handing out thousands of glow necklaces to the crowd along the parade route. Help us assemble them before the parade and then hand them out as we march!

• There are many other events going on in this year's Holiday on the Lake, including Hayrides with Santa, trolley rides, live music, Chowder Fest at Cornerstone Park, choirs and a Christmas Tree Lighting ceremony honoring veterans in Cornerstone Park, and lots of other festive activities.

See the flyers below for more information.

Mingle & Jingle at the Council Christmas Party on Sat. 12/20

Another fun and festive tradition continues with our Adult Christmas Party for members of our Council and Ladies Auxiliary on Saturday, December 20th at 6:00 p.m.

We'll have a complimentary (free!), informal, but very tasty hot buffet dinner including appetizers and favorite holiday selections. There will also be a cash bar and, for a special treat, members of our Ladies Auxiliary will once again be putting out a great spread for the dessert table.

All we ask is that each person bring a supermarket gift card for the less fortunate in our community, to brighten their Christmas season by helping them put good meals on the table for their families.

This year we are once again collecting donations for the St. James the Apostle Church Food Pantry. The parish recently conducted a drive to stock the pantry with canned goods and other non-perishables, but what they need now is supermarket gift cards so families can buy perishable items like milk, meats, fresh vegetables and frozen foods, which the pantry cannot stock.

So, please bring ShopRite, Tops, or other local supermarket gift cards to our party, and we will present them to St. James on behalf of the Knights and our families. The suggested minimum donation is $25 per person, but be as generous as you like.

Since we started this tradition not that long ago, we've collected over $17,500 in gift card donations to those in need. So let's show our Christmas spirit and do it again for our parish and our community!

Operation "Turkeys Away" Returns for 2025 With $5,000 in Donations

Always embracing the first principle of our Order -- Charity -- our Council continues to make a difference right here in Putnam County. Outreach to those in need is never more important than during the holidays.

We continued our annual tradition of donating turkeys to needy families in time for Thanksgiving. This year we assisted local people in need by distributing 90 turkeys and 100 ShopRite $25 gift cards on November 24th through Putnam's Community Action Partnership (C.A.P.).

We also donated 10 turkeys to St. James the Apostle School on November 21st.

Thanks once again to Treasurer Rich Dambra for sourcing and purchasing the turkeys, and arranging for their distribution. And thanks to our members for their generosity in approving the donation of $5,000 to make the purchase of these gifts possible.

So far this year, through November, our Council has donated over $40,000 to worthy charities, including $1,000 in scholarships. And our Ladies Auxiliary's charitable games have raised an additionl $7,000 for charity. Adding on top of that all of the volunteer service hours performed by our members and Ladies for our parish and our community leaves no doubt that our Council is working very hard to fulfill our mission of charitable service.

The Winter Holiday Blood Drive is SATURDAY 12/27

Donate by Appointment (Preferred)

Donors and Volunteers Needed

BRING IN THE NEW YEAR DOWN A PINT!

Join us at our winter holiday blood drive, set for SATURDAY, DECEMBER 27th from 10:00 a.m. to 7:00 p.m. at the Carmel Veterans of Foreign Wars hall, located at 32 Gleneida Avenue (Route 52).

As usual for this time of year, the blood supply is at a critical level!

We are once again encouraging donors to make an appointment. To make an appointment online, please visit the NY Blood Center web site Donor Portal by clicking here.

Or to schedule an appointment by phone, please call 1-800-933-2566.

We need volunteers to help with set up (at 8:00 a.m.), throughout the drive, and with at breakdown (at 6:45 p.m.).

We’re sorry to announce that we will one again have to forego our much talked about hot and cold buffet.

But we’re happy to announce -- just in time for the New Year celebration -- your choice of a HOLIDAY BEANIE or the highly acclaimed, with family heirloom status, NY Blood Center HOLIDAY SOCKS!

And courtesy of FIDDLERS GREEN PUB, the PINT for a PINT is back! For your donation of a PINT, you will receive a coupon for a PINT of fermented draft beverage, or a pint of carbonated sugar water.

REMEMBER TO PLEASE MAKE AN APPOINTMENT.

Any questions or concerns, or if you wish to volunteer, please call GK Rick Kreps at (845) 225-6318, or Denis Hanrahan at (845) 300-0428, or visit www.nybc.org for more information on donating blood.

The 10th Annual "J.O." Men's Beefsteak - Jan. 17th

SEATING IS VERY LIMITED

RESERVATIONS REQUIRED

THIS WILL SELL OUT!

DONATE TO OUR AUCTIONS & RAFFLE TABLE

Join us for our TENTH Annual James "J.O." O'Neill Memorial Men's Beefsteak Dinner on Saturday, January 17, 2026!

We continue the tradition started by J.O. by gathering at our Council to enjoy outstanding food, watch the NFL Playoffs on our big screen UHD-TVs, and have lots of fun while we raise funds for a great cause right here in our own community.

This year our funds will once again be earmarked for St. James the Apostle Parish!

Doors open at 3 p.m. for the afternoon playoff game and cash bar. Dinner at halftime of the first game (approx. 6 p.m.) includes our signature, charcoal grilled gourmet filet mignon, fries, draft beer or wine, dessert and coffee. Stay after dinner and watch the evening playoff game with us.

$65 if prepaid by Jan. 12 - $75 after Jan. 10 and at the door (unless we're sold out).

SEATING IS LIMITED & WE TYPICALLY SELL OUT, SO RESERVE TODAY!

You can purchase tickets at our December general business meeting on 12/10 by cash, check, or credit card. You may also mail your check and list of guests to: BEEFSTEAK, KofC Council 6318, 10 Fair Street, Carmel NY 10512.

IMPORTANT NOTE: To make this fundraiser a success, we ABSOLUTELY need donations of items for our live auction and raffle table, including sporting event tickets, theater tickets, gift certificates to local restaurants and other businesses, items for gift baskets, and stays in vacation homes. We also need bottles of quality wines and spirits for our baskets of cheer raffles. Please contact GK Rick about any donations you may be interested in making or soliciting for us.

Contact GK Rick Kreps (gk@carmelknights.org) or (917) 304-5378 with questions or to donate raffle / auction items.

The St. James Nativity Scene is Up!

At our council, we never forget that "Jesus is the reason for the season." That's why we proudly put up the Nativity Scene at St. James the Apostle Church each year on the Saturday after Thanksgiving in time for Holiday on the Lake, the Christmas Bazaar, and the Parade of Lights.

We remove it only after the Feast of the Epiphany. Our parish nativity scene is the only symbol of the birth of Jesus among all of the other secular holiday displays along Lake Gleneida.

We entirely rebuilt the stable in the summer of 2017, including all new LED lighting inside. We also upgraded the outside floodlights for the statues to LEDs as well. We waterproofed the stable in 2018 and last year, all of the statues were painstakingly hand repaired and repainted by a local artisan.

Thanks to our crew of volunteers who turned out again this year in the cold weather to keep the tradition alive. We are pleased to report that this year, there were no incidents or accidents involving the crew and the animal statues.

Fourth Degree News

The next meeting of Mother Cabrini Assembly will be Thursday, December 18th at our Council.

The meeting will begin at 7:30 p.m. in our Council Hall. All Fourth Degree Sir Knights are welcome and encouraged to attend the meeting.

2026 Dinner Raffle Tickets Now Available!

The Assembly is already selling 2026 "A Night Out on the Sir Knights" Year of Dinners Raffle so that tickets are available during the holidays. They'll have tickets available at the next meeting on December 18th, but there’s no need to wait until then. Contact FN Mike Vrabel and he'll arrange to get members tickets to sell.

And you can speak to any Sir Knight about buying tickets. They'll have tickets on hand at the Council Christmas Party on 12/20 for you to purchase. Tickets make nice stocking-stuffers, and holiday gatherings are a great time to give them to your friends and family members while they're in a jolly mood. 

Cash Bingo Returns Sunday Dec. 14

Our Ladies Auxiliary is hosting another fun-filled afternoon of CASH BINGO games at our Council on Sunday, December 14th, 2025.

Jackpot game is $500!

As always, proceeds will be going to worthy local charities.

Doors open at 1:00 p.m. First game is at 2:00 p.m.

Admission is $40 at the door, or only $35 if prepaid through Eventbrite. Click here to purchase your tickets.

Must be 18 years or older. There will be concession sales and Bell Jar tickets.

Contact Ladieskofc@gmail.com and see the flyer below for more information.

• Jan. 7 (Wed): Crèche Take-down - We're planning to take down the Nativity Scene at St. James, weather permitting, starting at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, January 6th. Please watch our social media for confirmation / updates as we get closer to the date. We'll need the usual tools. If there is snow on the ground, we'll also need a few snow shovels.

• Jan. 23 (Fri): Admission Degree - New members will be welcomed into our Order and our Council at an Admission Degree on Friday, January 23rd, at 7:00 p.m. (Candidates should arrive by 6:00 p.m. properly attired!) All current members are encouraged to attend in support of our newest prospective brother Knights. The new degree ceremony is brief (approximately 30 minutes) and dinner will be served afterward. Please encourage your Catholic gentleman friends and family to join our Order and become a part of our incredible Council. Speak to GK Rick or Chancellor Peter Carey for more information.