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RANCHO SANTA FE NEWS
DEC. 3, 2010
Multimedia artist brings color to North County By Lillian Cox
SANDY CLAWS Helen Woodward Animal Center’s Education Manager, Sumrall Rees, takes a break from her elf duties during the Nov. 19 Holiday Critter Carnival, to sit on Santa's lap and give him her Christmas list. Families came with pets to get a special photo with Santa Claus and youngsters enjoyed activities including a hill of fake snow. Courtesy photo
Pala again wins Four-Diamond Award PALA — Pala Casino Spa & Resort has earned the 2011 AAA Four Diamond Award marking the seventh consecutive year it has received that top recognition from the Automobile Club of Southern California. It is presented to hotel and restaurant general managers and executive chefs to recognize the award-winning
properties, which rank among the top 3.4 percent of more than 2,600 Southern California hotels, motels and restaurants inspected by the Auto Club, the nation’s largest AAA affiliate. “Recognition from the Auto Club with this top award for the seventh consecutive year is an ongoing tribute to every team member at
Pala Casino Spa & Resort,” said Bill Bembenek, Pala’s chief executive officer. “Everyone can take great pride in knowing that their daily commitment to quality and guest service continues to place them at the top of the industry.” For more information about Pala Casino Spa & Resort visit palacasino.com.
LEUCADIA — Ask anyone who knows her and you’ll learn that there’s something about Mary Fleener. Her distinctive outof-box thinking is reflected in her body of work from music to ceramics, paintings — and comic strips. “Mary’s life is a work of art,” said Jerry Waddle, owner of Ducky Waddle’s Emporium. “Her artistic voice is a modern derivative of Cubism but she has made it her own, Cubismo, and she is its master.” Fleener and husband Paul Therrio left Los Angeles around 1980 and used $28,000 she inherited from her grandmother’s estate to buy a home in Leucadia. She still considers herself a flower child. A visit to her home bears that out with a vintage landline telephone sitting on a table and no television. “I killed it five years ago,” she said. “I get Netflix and free movies from the library.” She has no interest in any mind-altering substances. Instead, she’d rather tend to her organic garden, hang out with Paul and their family of rescued pets, practice with her band The Wigbillies, or do her art. Fleener says she’s “selftaught” and inherited her abilities from her mother, an
CUBISMO Musician and artist Mary Fleener holding an illustration, which was printed in Guitar Playing Magazine in 1999. “It was small but I decided to turn it into a painting,” she said. “"I call my style ‘Cubismo.’” Photo by Lillian Cox
artist with Disney in the 1940s who worked on Donald Duck classics such as “Victory through Airpower” and “Three Caballeros.” Fleener became a working artist herself as a teenager,
Helping hands feed 40 families SOLANA BEACH — The Solana Beach Child Development Center organized a food drive providing turkey dinners to more than 40 families that have children in Harmonium’s Prime Time programs at Chavez, Baker, Marshall and Perkins elementary schools in south San Diego. The program was started up by Kelly Johnston of the Solana Beach CDC who in the mid 1990s managed one of Harmonium’s Child Care Centers. Johnston created a Day Care to Day Care relationship where a Solana Beach School is matched with a Harmonium Prime Time site.
They then collect food items for 10 families or more at that school. For 11 years, beginning Nov. 1, collection boxes are set out at Solana Beach school sites. The week before Thanksgiving, Johnston’s team, along with Harmonium staff headed by Miguel Ortega, consolidate all the donations and sort them for even distribution. This year Harmonium reached out to its Klassic Kids Child Care parents and agency staff. The families are selected in consultation with the principals of the schools to determine families who have the greatest need. Arrangements are then made
to personally present the food boxes to the selected families. In addition to this annual Turkey Drive, Solana Beach CDC also conducts a toy drive to the same schools and every child in all four schools receives a gift from Santa in person just before the children take their holiday vacations. Harmonium, a nonprofit agency that has been serving children and families in San Diego County since 1975, offered thanks to Kelly Johnston and her helpers Angelo Dentoni, Beth Hendershot, and Diana Escalera and all the Solana Beach contributors.
COAST CITIES — Ricochet is very excited about this second annual project, as it combines her
love of helping both children and animals. The beneficiaries of this year’s toy drive are Rady Children’s Hospital and Helen Woodward Animal Center. Last year, her toy drive generated donations from all over the world in connection with her inspirational video “From Service dog to SURFice dog,” that went viral on YouTube. As a result, more than $3,550 in donations were raised, and 638 children received toys for the holidays. Each year, thousands of children visit Rady Children’s Hospital facilities and a donation of a toy, game, or arts and crafts supplies can go a long way toward brightening a child’s
stay in the hospital or a visit to a clinic. Helen Woodward Animal Center is an agent of change for the animal welfare world. They use toys for their animals as a way to offer enrichment while they journey to find their forever homes. Donors can choose if they’d like to make a donation for a kid toy, or a critter toy... or both. Ricochet is accepting tax-deductible online donations toward toys through Dec. 17. She will then go shopping to purchase toys for the kids and critters. In addition, local drop
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selling old Lancer wine bottles she painted with flowers using model paint. She eventually moved on to ceramics, printmaking, painting on
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