• Three Events, One Day

Saturday morning saw Natalie's Rascals celebrate their first year in business. 

They had free doggie treats, a prize wheel (we won a mud bath for our dog - I'm guessing they'll be washing the mud off before returning him to us). They also were holding a raffle with many terrific prizes (winners to be drawn at the end of the day).

Natalie (middle holding poodle type dog), along with some happy customers.

There were also $10 microchips being offered to pet owners.

Nicely decorated treats on display. Inset shows the microchip promotion.

A couple of hours later, Discount Tire Centers had their grand opening.

A look at the front of Discount Tire Centers.

It was a fun time, and weather was great too. 

There was a Grilled Cheese Truck that had many tasty options, all courtesy of Discount Tires, plus several vendor booths.

Abby Benoit gets her arm painted.

KOLA radio was doing a remote broadcast, and they had a couple of games/contests during the time I was there.

Winners of the kissing contest were the Gary & Carrie Brown and Jaimie & Ben Benoit.

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At 1:00pm there was a ribbon cutting for welcoming Discount Tires to Wildomar.

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In the evening, Marna O'Brien Park was the site for Astronomy Night 2017.

Kids lining up for tickets to win a telescope.

About 80 tickets were given out to kids hoping to win one of twelve telescopes; thanks to the sponsorship of PVM and Interwest.

An estimate of 120 to 150 people attended.

Boy Scout troop 332 was selling popcorn.

Crew 332 was selling My Buddies Pizza, and they were able to put all the proceeds towards their projects. Thanks to My Buddies Pizza, and their generosity, for giving a big discount on the pizza and George Cambero for picking up the rest of the tab.

Also in attendance were the Temecula Valley Astronomers, the regional agency called WRCOG, SoCal Edison, Wildomar's Mayor Bridgette Moore, Mayor Pro-Tem Tim Walker, Councilmember Ben Benoit and District 2 city council candidate Dustin Nigg. 

During the presentation.

Since My Buddies Pizza showed some community spirit tonight, I'd like to let people know that they have a 25th anniversary party coming up soon. Check the flyer for details.

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‘It is an old maxim of mine that when you have excluded the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth.’
— Sir Arthur Conan Doyle/Sherlock Holmes, 

Wildomar Rap [remember to insert humorous anecdote here].

• Astronomy Night in Wildomar

What a great event for Wildomar.

Many thanks to John Garrett and Temecula Valley Astronomers for the enjoyable presentation and setting up their telescopes and allowing others to take a look at the night sky with them .

Looking at the Sun through a telescope was a first for me. They use special filters so you can safely view it and see 'bumps' around the edge of the Sun. I learned they are called a prominence.

A panoramic view of the inflatable screen that the presentation was projected on.

Manning the snack bar, selling pizza and sodas.

Ashley Fox chatted with me about her Girl Scout Silver Award project (click this link to read what a silver award is).  I'm going to write up a blog about her project soon. In brief, her goal is to raise $3500 for a swing that will accommodate those in a wheel chair. Before tonight she'd already gotten half way there with $1800 raised. Tonight they added nearly another $300 to the total. The next fund raiser is at Stadium Pizza on Monday May 12th.

You couldn't ask for better weather and the temps were perfect for family time outdoors.

SunPro Solar donated 12 of these telescopes to be raffled off. All those in attendance were giving a raffle ticket, free of charge, and there were two drawings throughout the course of events.

Four of our Five City Council Members were in attendance for the evening event.

Here you see a live projection of the moon (below) and setting up the equipment (above).

It's hard to judge crowd size, but it safe to say there were more than a baker's dozen and less than 1,000. Ok, my real guess would be around 200 people. More thanks goes to city staffers that put in a long day. 

As I was chatting with Public Works Superintendent Les Chapman, I like how he put it. That these kinds of events are what make us a community, and he'd like to see more of them. I was telling him about times I've driven to neighboring cities to listen to live music in the park while having a picnic, and he thought that would work well here too. We just need to get our parks department up and running.

Follow this link if you aren't already subscribed to the city of Wildomar's email alerts. It's the best way to keep up with when things are happening.

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You don't have to be a star gazer to follow Wildomar Rap.