A Supportive Family

My niece Rachel and my daughter Eleanor working at the Wedneday Community Meal today. In the background is my nephew Sam.

It's pretty much a given in my family that if you are visiting me on a Wednesday, I'll ask you to work at the Wednesday Community Meal.

My niece Maya and nephew Sam who live just blocks away from me are regular volunteers as is my daughter Eleanor and they helped again today along with my nieces Rachel and Gese who are visiting from Ellensburg, Washington.

Also joining us was Gese's friend Mary who was such a  good sport and enthusiastic when I asked her to help. She said she'd be happy to and that it actually sounded fun.  I felt spoiled having six extra helpers today.

Starting at 7 a.m. this morning, we made a shopping trip to Cash 'n' Carry for pork loin and salad ingredients. I knew we would have a large crowd with it being the fifth Wednesday of the month and wanted to be sure we had enough lean protein for our meal. It was so nice to have help carrying everything to and from the car.

Once in the kitchen of Trinity Episcopal Cathedral, there was lots of prep-work to be done. Eleanor and Rachel took on slicing just-picked cucumbers from garden of volunteer Kate and Gese and Mary washed and cut green beans from the Oregon Food Bank.

Maya was on kale chopping duty with Ginny and Fran and Sam helped get the pork loin ready for the oven.

My niece Maya helping Ginny and Fran chop kale for the meal. In the background in the white t-shirt is my other niece Gese.

The Wednesday Community Meal really is a team effort.

Once we started serving at 11 a.m, Gese and Mary worked at the exit table, handing out extra items like bread and pastries and saying goodbye to guests as they left. They said they really enjoyed meeting the guests and visiting with them.

Rachel worked alongside Amanda serving soup in the dining room.

Afterwards Rachel told me "the people who eat at the meal are so nice." They are nice people and so are my nieces and nephew for volunteering with me.

We served 400 meals today of oven-roasted pork loin, rice, seasoned slices of crisp cucumber and of course soup, salad and dessert.

Zane took on slicing all the pork loin today and did a super job.

Slices of garden-fresh cucumber donated by volunteer Kate.

Gosh I wish Rachel, Gese and Mary could stay longer and help again next week. I'm going to miss them.