UMM plans weekend for special-needs families

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Applications are now available for the 25th annual Special Family Weekend, reports Cynthia Vaughan of Levant.

Special Family Weekend, for children with special needs and their families, is June 13-15 at the University of Maine in Machias. The application deadline is Thursday, May 1.

The average cost for a family of four is $135, Vaughan wrote.

If you’ve never visited that part of Maine before, this is a great opportunity to enjoy the delights of that area. It’s a very welcoming campus.

Applications can be obtained by writing Vaughan at 54 Brann Road, Levant 04456; Lillian Leighton, 9 Eastbrook Road, Franklin 04634; or e-mail gigglesll@peoplepc.com.

Features of the weekend include a family workshop, “Where Are They Now?” and a Father’s Day celebration on Sunday.

The Where Are They Now? workshop will offer “an update from some of the parent planners (from a quarter-century ago) as they tell where their young adults are now,” Vaughan wrote.

STRIVE, which conducts Friday night social events in Portland, will lead the teen-youth activity, and children will be in child care while parents are involved with their own activities.

The weekend also features family entertainment, dancing, pool time, gym time, sharing time, a Yankee Swap, and a chance to sleep in the UMM dorms and dine in the UMM cafeteria.

For those who cannot be involved in this program, Vaughan offers you the opportunity to be supportive by sending a donation “to keep the weekend going.”

Donations for Special Family Weekend can be sent to either of the addresses above.

Leigh Butler of the Bangor Art Society reports abstract artist Barbara Brady will speak at 6 tonight in the Lecture Hall of Bangor Public Library on Harlow Street.

“Barbara will show some of her recent work and slides of the 2007 Venice Biennialle,” Butler wrote.

“As always, we invite the public to all our meetings,” Butler said.

From the Skowhegan-Madison Elks Lodge comes word of a benefit spaghetti supper and dance for one of its members.

Mike “Supie” Champagne, a self-employed logging contractor, has been unable to work while he is undergoing treatment for a serious illness.

The benefit begins at 6:30 p.m. Friday, April 25, at the Lodge on Silver Street in Skowhegan, and it is open to the public.

Admission fee is $5 for the dinner, or $10 for the dinner and the dance.

For more information, call the Lodge anytime between 1 and 11 p.m. at 474-3111.

River City Cinema is offering an extraordinary event you might enjoy.

Kathlyn Tenga-Gonzalez, RCC artistic director, said she heard from Harry Weiss, 92, who moved to Bangor last May “to be closer to his kids.”

For 71 years, Weiss explained, he performed publicly in New York and Florida, accompanying silent movies on the piano.

“He writes the music himself, often improvising, according to the audience’s reactions,” Tenga-Gonzalez wrote.

Weiss will be the accompanist when RCC presents Sergei Eisentein’s “The Battleship Potemkin” at 7:30 p.m. Saturday, April 26, at the Bangor Opera House, home of Penobscot Theatre Company, 131 Main St.

Admission is $5, and refreshments will be available.

Once again, Cheryl Murphy and Kathy Griffin, “Murph’s Maineiacs,” are preparing for the Breast Cancer 3-Day Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure in August in Boston, and are seeking your support.

The duo will hold its second annual Old Fashion Bingo, with doors opening for lunch at 11 a.m. and games starting at 1 p.m. Saturday, May 3, at the Sorrento Sullivan Recreation Center.

“We are now taking donations for raffles and prizes” they wrote, as well as gift certificates, merchandise and cash donations.

“If you can assist us, in any way, it would be greatly appreciated.”

To join Murf’s Maineiacs or for more information, call Murphy at 944-8977 or Griffin at 460-9931.

Jane Bragg of Thomas School of Dance in Bangor announced the school’s annual show May 10-11 would be a retrospective of the past 25 years.

Bragg “invites any former Thomasette who danced with her during the past quarter-century to join “current Thomasettes” in “Give My Regards to Broadway.”

Former Thomasettes, or anyone who knows a former Thomasette who wants to participate, can call Bragg at 945-3457 or e-mail thomasschoolofdance@gmail.com.

Bragg will need choreography notes and arrange a rehearsal before the show.

Joni Averill, Bangor Daily News, P.O. Box 1329, Bangor 04402; javerill@bangordailynews.net; 990-8288.