FUNdraising with Runners at the Fruita/Family Health West "Sweet Heart Run and Expo 2013"

Lumigrate's Grate Groove of the Grand Valley is participating in it's first outreach to the providers and consumers of the Grand Valley community with a booth on Saturday, February 9th, from 9 am to 1 pm at the SweetHeart Health Expo and 5k/10k FUNdraiser run/walk. It is a FUNdraiser and sponsored by Family Health West and the City of Fruita, held at the lovely community/recreation center. 

 There is a blog post about the event at www.lumigrate.com/blog/fundraising-runners-fruitafamily-health-west-sweet-heart-run-and-health-expo [1], talking about the Groove, and specifically what providers in the Groove are giving to those who encounter us at the event, either at the expo or by being a runner and getting an invitation in their gift bag.

This has been a lot of work so far, but it sure has been FUN already, stuffing the gift bags with our contribution to ALL runners (400 or more!), setting up the booth, which -- unbelievably -- is immediately next to Rocky Mountain Health Plans.  And as I toiled away for a few hours stuffing our contributions into the bags, I thought about the importance of government organizations such as recreation centers -- it was a Thursday night and the gymansium the storage room is off of was filled with young men, mostly, dribbling and playing basketball.

I thought about how the Evergreen Recreation Center had perhaps saved me from 'The Hill' behind it, which was up from our high school.

Many of my classmates and friends went that route, and became addicted to drugs. I can honestly say I never went further up the hill, to 'The Hill' than the rec center. We could rent a basketball cheap or play foosball if the guys came with us we'd play foosball, they seemed to have a little more money that my gal pals and I had. 

Amazing how two very different things can be going on right next to each other --- recreational drugs or recreational sports. Kind of like our table/booth at the Expo being progressive providers like Lumigrate and the Grate Groove right next to a progressive health insurance company (or at least they are non profit and looking at options for making changes as they can to embrace more effective health care for their members.)

One of the goals of the Grate Groove is 'cross-polination' with other providers and organizations and hoping to progress health care, so I couldn't have been more thrilled to be located in pollination distance! So come back! I'll be adding photographs and basically recording some of what went on, so that others can read and 'live vicariously' through us -- we really are in a GRATE place!