Cheers to the Holidays!

What another great Toastmasters meeting this past Wednesday!  

Although we had a smaller turnout from our member-base, we were lucky to have 3 new members attend as well as a guest.  The theme was Holidays, which was appropriate given that it was our last meeting before the Christmas season.  

Jane gave a great speech from her Advanced Communicator manual in regards to the benefits of Toastmasters.  She made some strong points, talking about some of the communication blunders from the British and Canadian governments (and Rob Ford….no more comments needed!) and how Toastmasters can make us stronger communicators and leaders.

Jane also discussed Maslow's Hierarchy of Human needs, and how Toastmasters can fulfill our need for friendship and the need to be recognized by others.  It also gives it members a feeling of accomplishment and self-improvement.  Jane wanted to say that Toastmasters can help its members fulfill our most basic requirements of food and shelter (insert laughter here), but I think we all agreed it was a bit of a stretch!!!

Brad graciously led a round of Table Topics, with questions from the Table Topic card deck.  One of our newest members- Laurie- won the session- Congrats!!!

As I mentioned, it is our last regular meeting until Jan 8th.  Next week we are off to Rembrandt's for some holiday celebration over lunch.

Marloes

Fun on the Run!

Wasn't that a song back in the 70s?

Oh no, that was Fox on the Run by the British band Sweet, first recorded in 1974.  Today's meeting we heard all about the FUN you can have while trying to stay fit by running.

You see, we have a runner on our team.  She took up running as a few years ago and has participated in two half marathons.  Her humorous speech fit well with the theme of the meeting (challenges) as well as the word of the day (adaptable).  This was project 6 in the Competent Communication manual with the objectives to use vocal variety to add interest and meaning to the presentation.

Well there certainly was interest.  There was much laughter from the audience and with the very descriptive words that were used, many of us could see ourselves in the very situations that she described.  Actually, if you talked to the presenter, the situations described were actually challenges she had while running, but they really were funny.

The other challenges we overcame at the meeting were a change in venue.  Unfortunately we did not have a meeting space at our our regular location so we were lucky enough to revert back to our previous meeting space.  Luckily it was just across the street.  Not very far to carry the material we needed.  We also overcame the challenge of putting on a top notch program.  This was important as we had three guests in the audience.  Two were returning from their visit last week.  All three are preparing too join us as regular members.  So we must have either impressed them or they were impressed with the Toastmaster program.  In either case, the club will get to know them and help them in their journey of developing their communication and leadership skills.

So why not stop in for a visit and see what Toastmasters can offer you?  You might learn a little about some activity you may be interested in or just be transported back to the big hair days of your youth.