29 Swing dancers participated in this years Monroe County "Spring Fling" on May 2nd. The Monroe County Executive, the Office for the Aging and over 400 Seniors were in attendance at the Burgundy Basin Inn. The Gates Swingers, an 18 piece band,provided live music.

There will be no Swing-In Thursday April 5th due to Holy Week services at the church. See you next week!

Friday afternoon March 9 OSHER Arts & Lectures, a learning organization affiliated with RIT for people 50+, sponsored a dance with Dick Otto & His Big Band Music Makers, with a tribute to OSHER Veterans. The organizer invited a group of RSDN Swing dancers to come to liven up the event and encourage others to dance. The nine dancers who participated achieved their mission as it didn't take more than a couple of songs before the dance floor was filled. The organizer had these complimentary words: "Thanks again to you and the other dancers for helping to make our event so much fun. It was great watching you all dance and you have motivated me, for one, to take some dance lessons."

RSDN participated at the Thompson Health DAY of DANCE Saturday February 25, at Eastview Mall. This event was to stress the importance of staying active to maintain good health. Dancing was highlighted as an excellent, fun activity to achieve this goal. In addition to our Swing demonstration, there were also ballroom, Jazzercise, Nia, and Zumba demonstrations. About 20 Swing dancers participated in the Swing demo portion. The audience was invited to partner with an experienced dancer, and the participants learned some Swing moves and then danced to a few songs. The organizer of this event commented: "Many people told us that the Swing dancers were their favorite dance of the day. We really appreciate everyone weathering the storm to dance for heart health! We hope you will consider joining us again next year! It was so very nice to meet all of the swing dancers. It was great fun and we really appreciate the support from RSDN!".

A group of 20 Swing dancers went to the Legacy at Cranberry Landing, an assisted living community in Irondequoit, on Saturday February 11 and put on a Swing demo to about 30 residents and staff members. We really enjoyed interacting with the residents, who were very friendly and quite talkative - We had at least ten residents up dancing with us at one time or another. More Big Band music was incorporated into the playlist than ever before and this was probably a reason why the residents enjoyed the experience so much. Without a doubt we were a big hit - got a nice round of applause after each dance. The Legacy's social director said they'd like us back and plans to tell the social directors of the other Legacy communities about us so we will likely be invited to those places as well. - update from Gary Barber. Thanks to Mary Wray & Gary Barber for organizing!