Happy Congress!!!

I know, I know - Congress was last week & I should be writing about Camp this week. But we were so busy having fun at Congress last week that I did not get a chance to tell you about it. So here goes!

NC 4-H Congress is the highlight of the year for our teen 4-H members. This year Richmond County took four of our wonderful teens, Nathan Ezzell, Grayson McQueen, Courtney Miller and Sarah Tyler to experience Congress. We stayed in the NCSU dorms, ate in the campus dining hall, and generally had a great time.

On Monday we arrived and got started in meetings. We got all of our stuff moved into the dorms and did our best to make them feel like home for the rest of the week. For the evening activity, we traveled to the State Fair Grounds and watched the County Flag ceremony and Fashion Review.

Tuesday was a big day! We started the day with State Finals for Presentations. Richmond County had two presenters, Sarah Tyler and Kristi Reep. Both did an awesome job and Sarah brought home Bronze for her presentation on Fire Safety and Kristi took the Gold for her presentation on Granny's Button Jar. They both did a great job! Congrats ladies!

Tuesday was also a big day for NC 4-H. It was the homecoming celebration for the NC 4-H Centennial! 100 4-H supporters were the first inductees into the NC 4-H Hall of Fame. Mrs. Helen Goodman and her late husband Victor Goodman, Sr. were both inducted into the Hall of Fame for their years of tireless efforts on behalf of Richmond County youth! We were so proud to have two of our outstanding supporters recognized on the state level! Congratulations!!!

After the induction ceremony, which was sponsored by the NC Grange, we headed over to join around 1500 guests at the Fair Grounds for dinner. Among several speakers, Mr. Larry Wooten, President of NC Farm Bureau, spoke about how 4-H and Farm Bureau can work together. Tuesday finished with the Rockin' Clover Bash dance and campaign speaches by state officer canidates. NC 4-H officers represent our members at a wide variety of functions and havning the best person for the job is important.

On Wednesday we all ventured out to our Hands to Service sites. This year, NC 4-H'ers offered over $20,000 worth of volunteer service throughout Wake County. Richmond County joined Chatham and Yadkin Counties at the Total Life Center (TLC), which was a Senior day program. The 4-H'ers helped the TLC participants do some crafts and "chair dances" which involved moving & shaking while staying seated. We ended our fun at TLC with a remdition of the Electric Slide that, if not technically outstand, was rather funny. After some free time at the mall, we all loaded up & headed to Johnston County for the first showing of 4-H Centennial, The Musical. All the 4-H'ers in the production did an outstanding job!

Thursday began with leadership workshops and ended with our Farewell Dance and is always a busy day at Congress. Teens spend most of the morning learning all kinds of things to bring back to the County, including Ambassador basics, teaching & learning styles and ethics. After a yummy lunch, all the 4-H'ers headed into officer elections. Races were really tight this year with 11 outstanding canadates and two runnoff elections. The final officers are: La'Miesha Wittington as President, as Michael Drake as Vice President, as John Norwood as Secretary and Ann Margaret Deitrich as Reporter.

After elections, it time to get ready for the Farewell Banquet and Dance! We all made alot of new friends and reconnected with old ones, and it was really hard to say goodbye to everyone, but we made sure we looked good doing it.

At the Banquet, Ms. Courtney Miller was installed as the South Central District Reporter. We are all very proud of her for taking on this big responsibility and are looking forward to seeing the scrapbook for this year. Before the dancing started, everyone headed to Dorton Arena for the candle-lighting ceremony. For anyone who has not seen it, the 4-H'er make a giant clover & pass flames from the state officers to members, just as 4-H'er's pass excitement for what they do on to others. After much fun was had at the dance, we all headed back to the dorms to pack & get ready to head home on Friday.

All in all, I think we had a great week at Congress! I could not have asked for better representatives of the Richmond County 4-H program and I am looking forward to seeing what these young people accomplish in the days, weeks and years to come. On a side note - the agent had a great year with only 2 wrong turns in Raleigh! Check out the rest of the Congress pictures!