At the Market, Yet Again

A hot, sunny market day drew a bunch of vendors and a lot of visitors to Point Roberts down to the Community Center center to the Saturday Market.  I was there talking about the new library plans and offering people a way to make donations.  (Sort of like, 'put money in this jar.')    By and large, I asked people as they came by whether they were cottagers or day visitors and most were cottagers.  Very few people I actually knew from the permanent resident crowd.  They all seemed pretty cheerful, on vacation time, kids and grandchildren in tow and happy to say good things about libraries.  But then, who really doesn't like a library?

Today, we had lots of handmade premiums to go with donations: hand-knit scarves and hats, quilted bookmarks, Point Roberts postcards, soft-and-light bracelets made from fabrics, jars of homemade jam, etc.  All made here in P.R. and donated to the library to help with fundraising.  And, we had raffle tickets for a new/in-the-box 32" flatscreen, color TV with all the latest technologies, which was given for library fundraising.  All in all, people contributed about $500 to the new building fund today, while the Friends of the LIbrary made about the same amount from its booksale.  All of which gets matched by the $20,000 matching grant (good to the end of August).

Where are we on the matching gift?  Last week, this community had raised $7,500 toward the $20,000 matching gift, and by today, that's more like $9,500, and we still have over a month to contribute the remaining $10,500.  We're pretty much on schedule with this, it seems to me.  And very grateful to all those who are contributing.

Next weekend, we'll be at the Arts and Music Festival (Lighthouse Park) with the TV raffle tickets (the drawing will be on Sunday at the end of the day).  Tickets are $10 each or 3 for $25.  And there'll be a few other things to tempt you, including some small portrait quilts of Point Roberts.  Come by, say hello, pick up a donation card, win a TV, buy a quilt: whatever...