Dear All, As Mollie Golden wrote, "...if you weren't here for Rocky's OFEST, you missed a great fundraiser and party!" Thank you Mollie for those kind and supportive words. Likewise, I appreciated the responses that Jean Caputo-Lee and Michelle Butler also wrote on my behalf. There was an attempt to discredit me, hurt our shelter and fundraiser. The attempts started first on The Ferret Store Forum, and the mod there deleted those threads. Then they brought it to the FML. Folks, my guests started arriving three days before OFEST, and I really was having too much fun, and the mood was so positive that ya just couldn't mess with my spirit and sense of humor. In fact, we had folks intentionally come to OFEST out of curiosity, and they stayed and had a great time with other ferret enthusiasts! Also, I'm still getting supportive calls and emails. Thank you all very much. There were shelter ops and volunteers from at least 6 different shelters, and about 80 guests, from all over the country here to party, and party we did! In case you don't understand, our events are not shows, they are parties for people that share a love of ferrets. Into the wee hours of any of our parties you will find a big circle of new and old friends sitting around a huge roaring bonfire. There they find out that they have far more in common than ferrets. As usual, all folks were welcomed to camp out on the farm too! We had the support of the ferret community in so many ways, and our raffles were the best ever. I have so many to thank for donations for raffles, but would like to put a special thanks out to Elle at The Ferret Depot, our friends at The Ferret Store, Skip Martin of Martin's Cages, and more than we can name here, but be sure to look for our webpage listing everyone and acknowledging our gratitude. Special thanks to our favorite DJ, the famous ferretone himself, BOB ADAMS! He rocked and emcee'd all day and evening. And then he put up with all of us doing Karoake until 3:30am!!! We celebrated Rocky's Ferret Rescue and Shelter's anniversary of 11 years. We are proud of the job we've done, the service to the community, and most of all the upwards of 3,000 ferrets that have been rescued, restored to health and re-homed into loving caring forever homes. These are critical times for shelters. Please consider adoption and/or fostering, and help keep our private shelters from being overburdened, and the shelter ops overwhelmed. Thank you all for helping us once again, to keep our doors open and give care to so many wayward ferrets! I'm very grateful to Denise Kamarunas, Kim Sikorski, Michelle Butler, and Barry Edwards...Rocky's Board of Directors. Barry has put a few of the pics from OFEST 2006 together in a slide show. We invite you to visit and enjoy!.... http://www.rockysbod.com/oktoberfest2006/data/index.html Look foward to the announcement of the date for Rocky's FERRETSTOCK 2007 in the Spring! Come out from behind those computers and get to know each other up front and personal! Hey, where else can you see Shelter Moms from all over the country, pole dancing for donations!!!! lol Thank you and God bless, Barbara Clay Dir of Shelter Affairs for Rocky's www.rockysferrets.com [Posted in FML 5401]