Denim & Diamonds Gala set for Saturday

The Plant A Seed… READ! Denim & Diamonds Gala is set for Saturday, a fundraiser for the organization’s new children’s museum, the Play to Learn Center.

The event will have a prime rib dinner, live and silent auctions, a 50/50 raffle and more to help the organization get this project off the ground.

Plant a Seed…READ! Executive Program Director Lorraine Verploegen said the Play to Learn Center is a children’s museum designed for children from 1 to 5 years old to promote early learning readiness skills through hands-on educational experiences including literacy, science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics, and it has been a long time coming.

Verploegen said this is a project that they’ve wanted to do for more than 13 years and is Phase Two of their long-term plan for their organization. They want to use this event not just to raise money, but to honor those who have already given, she said.

“We’ve never had the chance to really honor the donors and the people in our community that have played an important role in promoting early childhood readiness,” she said last year.

The event was originally going to run in fall of last year, but she said there was too much going on at the time and they delayed it until winter, specifically until I Love To Read Week, which she said was fitting.

She said the majority of a child’s potential is developed in the first five years of their life and reading to them and providing the chance for hands-on activities that help them learn is crucial to their development.

Since the delay, Verploegen said, they have received a huge amount from businesses and individuals, in cash donations and in-kind donations.

“They say it takes a village to raise a child and the villages of Hill and Blaine county stepped up to the plate and provided,” she said. “... We are very overwhelmed with the kindness.”

She said the organization has used the time since the delay to set up an advisory council, settle on a tentative location in the Holiday Village Mall and begin grant writing.

At the event, she said, they will be giving out an award to a couple of their donors who hit the $10,000 mark, donors who made it possible to provide their services to young children in the community when they otherwise couldn’t have.

Verploegen said they will also honor a local organization for their own work supporting early childhood development.

The gala will be at St. Jude Parish Center from 6 to 9 p.m.

The dinner will be prime rib with smoked potatoes and roasted veggie prepared by McCord and Jenny Parks from Jenny’s Kitchen, with dessert prepared by Ginger Hanson and beverages provided by Vic’s Place.

Verploegen said in addition to the live and silent auctions, there will also be a surprise game where two people can win tickets to next year’s gala, and the 50/50 raffle will see its proceeds go toward a scholarship to Montana State University-Northern for an education major.

Two people, she said, will win $2,000 cash prizes, and two more will win $1,000 to Tilleman Motor Company or Valley Furniture.

Tickets can be found at https://form-renderer-app.donorperfect.io/give/plant-a-seed..read/denim-and-gala and anyone interested in donating in general can call their office.

Verploegen said anyone who donates $100 will be named a sponsor.