Sunday was the season's closing event for Music In The Park in Los Gatos, and the immensely popular Joe Sharino Band made for a great sendoff. Folks arrived early and danced lots. The weather could not have been nicer or the crowd happier. It was packed, but happy.

Thank you, volunteers and sponsors!

As with all the free concert series in town, Music in the Park is supported by sponsors and would never happen without a lot of volunteers. A special thanks to Valerie Hopkins, the Music in the Park Arts Commission Volunteer who does so much to make this event a huge success each year!

This week, the sponsors were the Beck Family, the Community Hospital of Los Gatos, and Intero Real Estate Services in Los Gatos (eight agents or teams: Kate Adams, Diana Crawford, Wendy & Rick Ebster, Bob & Kelly Kaufman, Joette Schenck - who chaired our committee and did a fabulous job, Greg Simpson, Keith Walker & Mary Clark and yours truly, Mary Pope-Handy). Several of the agents brought (dragged?!) family members along to help. Keith Walker's kids did a great job with the helium tank and getting balloons ready to give. Joette's husband, Dick, helped with that endeavor too, tying on the ribbon. So, too, did my 16 year old daughter, Clair.

And we're only talking about one day in the series!

To sponsor a show usually involves a lot more than simply writing a check, though of course the money is what moves things along. We Intero of Los Gatos Realtors had meetings for weeks ahead of time to sort out who would do what for this event. It was our hope to make it fun (invite our clients, family and friends), use the platform to promote the Intero Foundation and to "give back" to the immediate Los Gatos community too.

So with that in mind, we gave away child-pleasing red and white helium-filled balloons and chilled bottled water to the appreciative crowd. Additionally, we agents chipped in to buy wine which could be given out for a suggested $5 donation to the Intero Foundation (our $160 outlay brought in $852 for the foundation - we were thrilled! Thank you to ALL who donated to this great cause!)

And many of us also invited our friends, neighbors, clients and others to drop by the booth. There each agent had his or her own wine to pour, or goodie bags to hand out, etc.  So understandably, there was "wine confusion" at the booth since there was a private cache and the wine for a cash donation.

"How does the wine work?"  seemed to be the question of the day.

Most folks were really good about the lack of signage on the wine situation and just asked.

Some weren't!  To my surprise, a few people came up to the booth and just helped themselves to bottles they saw on the table, filling their cups without asking.  And at least two entire bottles were taken as well.

Perhaps seeing the big Intero banner made people think that the wine and all was just somehow provided by a big company. I thought it might be good to blog about it because folks should know that it's the individual Realtors who are buying the water the wine, the balloons, the helium etc. And this is true for all the booths at these types of events - whether Intero, Sereno Group, Alain Pinel, or Coldwell Banker, or anyone else is sponsoring one of these events, Music in the Park or Jazz on the Plazz etc.

Luckily, this was a really minor note in a totally fabulous musical event. Today at my office, everyone involved was ecstatic that we'd raised so much money for the Intero Foundation. And it was a fun time.

Tomorrow I'll return the enormous helium tank that is clanking around in the back end of car. Then I will be done with my part of the Music in the Park sponsorship for 2007. (It was quite a bit of work. And it was worth it!) I also helped to support the Jazz in the Plazz event for August 1st but was unable to attend that event as I was at Bloggers Connect in San Francisco. With that one, I wrote a check and did a little background work but nothing as involved as yesterday's happening, but did not know our assigned date when I volunteered to be a sponsor for it.

The kids are back in school and the summer music series are winding down. Jazz on the Plazz has one more this Wednesday. Vasona Vibrations is done for the season. It's almost September. I hate to see summer go! But each year, summer in Los Gatos gets better and better. No wonder we want to see it last forever.

(To see a related article with good photos on this event, please visit the Los Gatos Observer.)