The countdown is on...

The past few weeks have been crazy busy with Relay For Life.  A few years ago, when I started getting involved with Relay on a division and national level, it changed the "Relay year" a bit.  Instead of the crazy crunch time happening just before the event in the early summer...it gave a new crunch time: what I used to consider "the Relay offseason".

For the last three years, I've been part of the Training Task Force for the Great West Division, where we design the training for the Relay volunteers to get them trained for their individual events.  How to chair an event, how to develop your teams and fundraising, how to run the Relay.  The TTF's crunch time is in the spring and early summer, requiring you to not only be thinking of the current year (for the team you're on) but the year ahead (the NEXT year's Relay season) for the trainings. 

This year, as I transitioned off the TTF, I was invited to help develop the General Sessions for the Regional Summits -- 18 in all for the Division.  

Our crunch time is right now -- as we prep for the dry runs and finalize all the flow of everything.  My main focuses have been on the luminaria ceremony, a fun "Relay Runway" style fashion show to unveil all of the new goodies for 2011, drafting the scripts for the MC for the general sessions, and getting to help with the flow of it all. 

To help message the mission/delivery of the Summits, there's a major "train the trainer" weekend coming up in Arizona where we'll get to "dry run" all the trainings, sessions and tweak anything that doesn't sparkle in the first round.

I've loved these new challenges -- though it feels like my early mornings (before Thomas gets up), his naptimes, and after he goes to bed have been filled to the brim with purple goodness.   

This fall will be a blast -- lots of Relay travel -- Arizona twice, Oregon, and trainings for the Mid-South Division and the Illinois Division (through the Nationwide Leadership Training Team).  Planning on ending with some good downtime in Hawaii with the fam just before Christmas gets here, with tree season beginning. 

I feel so blessed to be able to give back in so many ways to the Society.  And I can't wait to see how it all comes together...because it will be here before we know it!