GFWC LUTZ-LAND O’LAKES WOMAN’S CLUB proudly announces its seven 2020 Scholarship recipients  for a total of $25,000 of awards.

Recent Steinbrenner High School graduates, Maddison Rametta (UCF), Noah Morrow (UF) & Crystal Nwokoye (FAMU), all residents of Lutz, have each been awarded $5,000 scholarships  from the (decommissioned) Lutz Volunteer Fire Department Endowment Fund, administered by the Woman’s Club.   The Woman’s Club congratulates the recipients and wishes them every success in their college careers.

Four 2020 Annual Club Scholarship awards in the sum of $2500 each were given to four recent graduates of  Steinbrenner High School, Brianna Sandner (FGCU), Joseph Pereira (USF) and Maggie O’Shea (FSU) and Sunlake High School graduate Morghan Copeland (UF).

Nancy Taylor delivering donation of $50 worth of food for St. Vincent DePaul homeless & needy.

GFWC LUTZ-LAND O’LAKES WOMAN’S CLUB members visited 2 area cemeteries in Lutz and Land O’Lakes and placed flags on the gravesites of veterans.  It has been as decades’ long tradition for the Woman’s Club to honor our veterans, however this year, due to covid-19, the group was smaller out of necessary caution and safety.  Nonetheless, we respectfully remembered our veterans for their service with flags and with prayers of appreciation.

GFWC LUTZ-LAND O’LAKES WOMAN’S CLUB President Annette Bellingar has kept its 100+ members informed, in-touch and entertained during these long weeks of solitary at-home work, being unable to meet and carry on its usual busy calendar of events and projects to benefit the community. Kudos to Ms. Bellingar for introducing her members to ZOOM meetings, as well as fun “game days” including Zoom Bingo and a Scavenger Hunt, with more games to follow. The club women have been far from idle, continuing to donate funds to Metropolitan Ministeries, CARES of Pasco, Christian Social Services of Land O’Lakes and others, as well as sewing hundreds of face masks for the community, sleep mats for the homeless and so much more. These ladies are anxious to return to their normal schedule of community service but are certainly keeping busy during this cautious period of dealing with covid-19.

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GFWC LUTZ-LAND O’LAKES longtime member, ANIKO SOLOMONSON, has single-handedly made a cottage industry of crocheting recycled plastic bags into weatherproof sleep mats which she has distributed to the area homeless since 2014. Ms. Solomonson has taught fellow club members and many other groups how to fold the bags into lengths of “rope” and crochet them into mats. Members, under Aniko’s guidance, have saved countless vehicles full of recycled plastics from going to landfills and have helped those living on the streets with these sleep mats. Aniko alone has produced 300+ mats and delivered many to The Well, which serves the home-insecure population in Tampa. Ms. Solomonson has temporarily halted this project to give priority to sewing more than 70 face masks for various groups and, post-corona, will be resume her “mat” work.