March 7, 2026

NLAPW—Denver Branch

March 7 Minutes

Meeting via Zoom

  1. Linda called the meeting to order at 9:31.
  2. Members present: Linda Volin, Sue Luxa, Risa Waldt, Marion Mike, Diane Chambers, Atlanta Sheridan, Kelly Ann Compton
  3. No guests were present.
  4. Inspirational Reading: Risa read from Sara Hamdan’s What Will People Think?
  5. The February Minutes were approved.
  6. Treasury Report: Our current balance is $115.16. Sue suggested that we consider having everyone chip in $20 to help our money situation.
  7. Committee Reports:
    1. Membership:
      1. Last month’s guest Abbi Kaplan is interested in joining NLAPW and our Denver Branch. Diane will contact her.
      2. Diane and Marion are working on an article for publication that will inform readers about the National League of American Pen Women and our Denver Branch to help increase membership. They have a list of newspapers and requested help with names of magazines the article could be published in. For any pictures used, permission to use pictures must be considered.
      3. Sue suggested the newspaper Prime News. It is a free and maybe our branch could do a column for the newspaper.
      4. Sue has spoken with Colorado Life via email. Colorado Life is focused on Colorado history. Sue will call them to learn the word count and other information for the newspaper.
      5. Much discussion took place regarding how to go about getting articles published.
      6. Linda will contact National about us writing/publishing articles and photos.
    2. Programs:
      1. March—From Author’s Publish, we will watch a video of Ángela Alverez Vélez speaking about “Tools to Help You Write Layered Stories, Not Stereotypes.
      2. April—Video on mixed media
      3. May—Character development. An open discussion facilitated by Marion.
      4. June—Video on the history of NLAPW’s making of The Tapestry for Peace.
      5. Jacob Jan has free videos on author talks.
    3. Zoom: Zoom is working well.
    4. Website: Virginia Small’s report stated that the website is going well. Members of our Denver Branch need to let Virginia know about updates to their bios and accomplishments.
    5. Historian:
      1. Sue stated that she is working on finding what Denver Public Library would want for their archives from our branch.
      2. We need to contact Karen Gonzales to see if she has saved copies of the meeting recordings from when she ran Zoom for our meetings.
    6. Critique Group: Marion reported that she found the critique group to be very beneficial to her writing. She received a lot of information and things to investigate regarding the topic of her writing.
    7. Elections:
      1. Rachel has offered to be co-secretary as needed. Diane has offered to remain Vice President.
      2. We need someone to volunteer to be President of our branch. Linda cannot continue as President.
      3. Atlanta and Kelly Ann will send out another email or two seeking a volunteer to be president of our branch. It was suggested that we have co-presidents so the job would be shared. Diane made the point that the vice president works with the president.
  8. Member News: Marion placed third in one of the biennial competitions for a haiku she wrote. She also explained Eckrastic poetry, which is writing poetry to art.
  9. Announcements:
    1. Linda reminded members to vote the National ballot found in the Pen Woman magazine.
    2. Pen Woman magazine wants members to write Limericks and to submit those limericks by March 17.
    3. Places our branch is advertised:
      1. Linda found that we have a Denver Branch Facebook page.
      2. We advertise NLAPW and our branch at the craft show we partake in.
  10. The meeting was closed at 10:30 am.

Kelly Ann Compton, Secretary

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