Last week, the Waiver Review Team visited Stevens and Traverse Counties in western Minnesota. We stayed in Morris, Minnesota for our entire trip and experienced a team first – we ate at the same restaurant all four nights. We loved the homemade food at Bello Cucina so much we couldn’t stay away. Here you see Eric, Liz and Danielle enjoying white chocolate cheesecake with a raspberry sauce and dessert nachos. Yum!

Our trip wasn’t just fun and games. Eric, our database expert, just let us know we reviewed our 3,000th case last week in Stevens County. We were more than happy to celebrate that exciting milestone.

Posted by Guest author at 08:19 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

On April 20th, under the guise of a meeting to learn our new phone system, the staff of the Improve Group surprised Becky Stewart a Baby Shower.

It was great fun. Staff members brought brunch items and decorated onsies for the new baby. One of our gifts to the new mom and dad was a replica of Evaluator Bear. E.B. is the wonderful comic strip created by Becky's husband Meleck and published in our monthly Improve Groove Newsletter.

Our best to soon-to-be parents, Becky and Meleck.

Posted by admin at 09:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

EVENT ALERT

AchieveMpls works to provide quality education for all Minneapolis students. Catherine Jordan, Executive Director of AcieveMpls notified us of an event to support students and enjoy a Twins Ballgame all at the same time.

The Twins battle the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim and former MN Twin Torii Hunter on Friday, April 17th. Ticket package for the Achieve Tailgate event include parking within walking distance of the stadium, a catered dinner and an upper ($25) or lower ($35) deck ticket to the game to the game.

Achieve will be giving away 8 Twins bobble-heads. Enjoy baseball indoors before you have to brave the Minnesota weather!! To join in the fun register at www.achievempls.org.

Posted by admin at 12:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Chicago Opera Theater's Opera for All program brings professional performers into K-12 Chicago classrooms for a rigorous opera experience tied to the Theater's premier performance of the season. This year, Chicago Opera Theater is debuting a new opera called A Flowering Tree. Each class learned about the opera itself, as well as musical concepts, culture and the arts and the history and context of opera as an art form. Each class has a culminating performance -- with student responsibilities including writing, performing, directing, and set and costume design.

One high school class recently performed Pirates of Penzance, one of Leah's favorite operas as a kid. We've had the pleasure of working with the Opera for All program to design an evaluation that helped to better define the program's goals and outcomes.

Posted by admin at 11:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

We had a fun time celebrating Susan and Liz’s birthdays at lunch today. At the request of the birthday girls, we enjoyed Panera sandwiches, soup, salad and chips and finished off our celebration with some cookies and birthday apple pie. Yum! We brainstormed on costume ideas for the next Harry Potter book release and laughed about some recent sketches on the Daily Show. We always have a fun time at these celebrations and it was a great break from a busy week in the office.

Posted by Guest author at 02:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)