Livin' the Dream: Hut, hut...

At the request of a former supervisor of mine, I’ve been doing some pro bono work lately for the Trent Green Family Foundation.

It’s all been building up to this event last Thursday night for Phoenix Family, an organization that provides critical support services to more than 5,300 residents at 32 low-income communities in Kansas and Missouri. After learning about the impressive work it does, seeing how legit it is and recognizing several names on its board of directors, my first thought was, “Why haven’t I heard of this before?!?”

Phoenix Family’s executive director said during one of our meetings that they throw a good party ... and she was right (it’s probably the only benefit dinner I’ve been to with drag queens). Here, Leslie and I bid on some silent-auction items during the cocktail reception.

A couple pics Leslie snapped of the pre-set desserts.

The menu described them as 1. Emerald Mint and Milk Chocolate Mousse Tower served on a Chocolate Painted Yellow Brick Road (above), and 2. Chocolate Ruby Red Slipper filled with White Chocolate Mousse with painted Over the Rainbow Trio of Sauces (below).

After dinner, Trent made the biggest announcement in the foundation’s 14-year history:

A quarter-of-a-million-dollar donation to create the HIKE Reading Achievement Program! It’s a five-year commitment to help instill the key to education and raise reading levels for the more than 2,000 Kansas City-area children in Phoenix Family communities. As he said from the podium, “HIKE combines the best practices from literacy, volunteer and youth development programs across the country to create an approach to the literacy issue that hasn’t been done here. Simply put, it's a game changer.”