Summer Picnic – Valley Forge Park, July 17

Come join us for some summer fun and bring family and friends. We will be at Wayne’s Woods Picnic Area of historic Valley Forge Park, near King of Prussia on July 17th starting at 11:30 am.  Rain date is the following Sunday, July 24. Please RSVP to this email or contact me at gredos@verizon.net and let me know how many people will be coming with you.

This is what you need to bring:

  • Bring your own lunch and some food item to share with others: chips, soda, cookies, veggies, etc.
  • A towel or blanket to lay down on the ground
  • Something to play with: Frisbee, football, baseball glove, bat and balls, etc.
  • Don’t forget the sunscreen!

Directions
To get to the park, use the following address on your GPS or you might be sent to the wrong place:
1400 North Outer Line Drive
King of Prussia, PA 19406
This will get you to the Visitor’s Center. Once you are in the park, you need to get to the Wayne’s Woods Picnic Area

Wayne’s Woods Picnic Area
This picnic area is located on South Outer Line Drive, along The Encampment Tour route, and in between the National Memorial Arch and the General Anthony Wayne Statue (tour stops 3 and 4 respectively). These picnic grounds open up to a large mown field with the National Memorial Arch in the background.

Directions from the Visitor Center:

  • Keep right at the fork and follow North Outer Line Drive along The Encampment Tour route.
  • Follow N. Outer Line Drive for approximately 2 miles.
  • Make a right into the Wayne’s Woods Picnic Area parking lot.

Chapter Meeting – June 21, 2016

We welcomed two new people today. Mark, who is the NSA Chapter Leader at Penn State and doing a Summer internship in Philadelphia, and Cat a junior college student.  We had pizza donated by Giovanni’s today too.

We started with chapter business such as the upcoming NSA Annual Conference. Also reminded to everyone that our next meeting, which would have been July 7th, has been cancelled due to our attendance to the conference. The NSA has asked all chapters to donate $50 gift cards to be used at the Conference for raffles and silent action baskets.  If you would like to contribute please contact me at gredos@verizon.net.

We learned about what brought Mark and Cat to their first meeting at our chapter and we went on talking about what we get out of coming to meetings. Some of the answers were:

  • learn what others do, what worked and what their mistakes were so that we don’t repeat them,
  • being part of a group, getting a sense of community,
  • for some of us that have been members for a long time, we like being there for the newcomers and be able to give back,
  • meetings are reminder that we are not alone. There are people that help you and support you,

John didn’t know what to expect when he first started coming a few months ago. He didn’t expect to get help and although he can’t pinpoint anything specific that he has learned or done since then, he has found that just coming to the meetings has helped him. Just seeing how other people approach their own stuttering and relate to it, how they accept it.

We are planning a picnic next month, Sunday July 17 at Valley Forge Park. A separate announcement will be sent shortly with more details. Hold the date!

The meeting was cut a little short because a fire alarm went off and we had to evacuate the building. We continued our meeting outside for a little longer and then called it a day.

Chapter Meeting – June 2, 2016

Lou Madonna joined us at this meeting! It was very nice seeing him.  He looked well and was in very good spirits.  He is preparing for his upcoming surgery and taking good care of himself.  We were a total of four.

Mitch filled us in the movie “The way we talk”, a documentary about stuttering that premiered in Philadelphia on May 11th at Children’s Hospital. Three people from our chapter were in between the 60 people that attended. The documentary interviewed several people that stutter, their friends and family, and several professionals, one of them a geneticist that stutters.  After the movie there was a Q&A session with the producer, a person who stutters, which used crowd-funding resources to produce the movie and make it a reality.

Mitch also told us about a one-day workshop he attended, held by the New York NSA chapters. We talked about the possibility of doing something like that at our chapter.

We spent the last part of the meeting talking about SLP assessments: If we were evaluated by an speech language pathologist, what would we like him/her to evaluate us on? What questions should they ask?  How should they observe us?  As you would guess, we had a lot of input to offer!

It was a very good meeting that was made better by having Lou with us. We all wish him a prompt recovery and look forward to good news from him on the health front.