On May 19, 2007, the FBCDFWI held their first Annual May Fest event, and what a SMASHING SUCCESS it was!

 The following were in attendance, members Ashley Allen with two of her children, Joyce French, Bill Trautwein, Shally Carlson, Shelley Ross, Trudy Bettinger, Johnan Ratliff, Jancyne Dulemba, Kathy Carlson, Brandi Scott, visitors Steve and Stacey Haller with their three children, Bill and Lynn McGinnis, Guy French, Gary Ferguson, and Guest Speaker, Steve Hoffland.  WOW!  TWENTY TWO people.  I believe our May Fest had a record attendance of any club event with the exception of our regional specialty shows, and we all had a BLAST!

In addition to the 22 humans in attendance, we had an abundance of Frogdogs, at least THIRTEEN French Bulldogs of various shapes, ages, and sizes that joined in the activities and festivities.

We could not have chosen a better day or location to hold the May Fest.  The temperature was perfect for Frogdogs and humans, and the Ratliff Building has a wonderful outdoor picnic facility with plenty of shade and grassy exercise areas to accommodate all very comfortably.  In addition there is ample black top parking for everyone's vehicles with plenty of additional surface that Kathy Carlson used to set up her Rally course and demonstration.

We started the festivities off with our guest speaker from Nutro Pet Foods, Steve Hoffland, who gave an informative presentation on the benefits of feeding the holistic brand of Nutro Ultra, how to interpret specific food ingredients, AAFCO's role in dog food preparation, and the nitty gritty regarding the recent dog food recall. 

Steve did a wonderful job fielding questions on that very hot topic of the recent dog and cat food poisoning, and made everyone feel at ease in asking those uncomfortable questions.  He came bearing gifts of Vouchers for FREE BAGS of NUTRO ULTRA, and T-Shirts for each of our guests. 

At the conclusion of Steve's presentation, we filled our plates with all the wonderful picnic foods and desserts that each of our members and visitors brought for our May Fest dining pleasure (most of the dishes home-made), and proceeded to hold our General Membership Meeting.  The most significant development in that meeting was the unanimous acceptance of new members, Guy French and Gary Ferguson. We welcome you both with open arms!

With the meeting behind us, it was on to the FUN & EDUCATIONAL portion of our event; Rally & Agility demonstrations brought to us by Kathy Carlson and some of her infamous Fab 4 Frenchies.  The Rally course was set up on the black top drive, while the Agility course was constructed out in the large grassy area adjacent to our picnic pavilion.

Kathy used one of her frogdogs to demonstrate how to use the Rally course, while explaining how the Rally competition worked, and then encouraged us to grab our Frenchies and give it a whirl.......and WE ALL DID!

Needless to say, after running through the Rally course with our kids, we couldn't wait to give that Agility course a try. 

Again, Kathy and her girl started off the Agility demo so everyone could get the hang of how to use the equipment.  I don't think any of the Frenchies took issue with making the jumps, but the tunnels were another matter.  Some of those kids didn't like the idea of entering the tunnel, and then some, like Shelley's boy Albin, took his new crochet dog toy (thank you Shally) into the tunnel and refused to come back out.  hahaha....he had found a safe haven where he could enjoy his new toy in peace and quiet and it took quite a bit of coaxing to convince him to come out of the tunnel again.

We did have a few, like Lynn McGinnis' kiddo and Joyce French's new baby girl that thought that tunnel was pretty cool and neither of them minded running in and out of it, or stopping to pose for a photo op.

After all was said and done, everyone was worn out, well fed, very glad they made the effort to attend our first annual MAY FEST and all are looking forward to participating at our next Club event !