Alright, Skyview.... Forgive my "Marie Antoinette" speech.
I'm the eternal optimist. My cup is more than half full, it 'runneth over'. And you're probably right about the tv viewing habits of the average American too! I didn't watch anything. I was at karate class getting kicked around.
afreil - I hope things look better for you in the light of day. It must've stung pretty bad to have reality crash right into your fantasy meeting scenario. Here's the optimistic view - You were a raging success. Because of your meeting, you
doubled the size of your festival committee!
All kidding aside, your current reality is that you have a short period of time before your festival so you need to hit the ground running. Here's what I'd do next:
1. Take a deep breath and then divide tasks between you and your new best friend.
2. Find folks to lead the five sub-committees you've defined: Silent Auction, Promotion, Volunteers, Food & Beverage, Games.
3. Empower them to lead their sub-committee and request frequent updates via phone, email, memo, whatever.
4. Throw away the 'meeting' mentality. People hate meetings. As long as they're doing the work and reporting regularly, move along.
5. Search these message boards using a variety of key terms: Winter Carnival, Fun Fair, etc. Many folks have offered tips on how they succeeded with their events and you'll find tons of useful information.
Go ahead and have pity parties, come in here to vent (it's a safe place for that), comiserate with hubby and/or friends, whatever you have to do to blow off some steam. But RobinD is right, you have to put your best, most cheerful face out there for the public. Make each person who joins your committee feel like they're the best thing that ever happened to you. Make the work fun and the people feel important. Those feelings are catching and before long you really will have a strong volunteer base.
