Briefs: Community Thanksgiving service in Elgin

Vineyard Church of Elgin, 220 Division St., will host the Pastors' Prayer Group of Elgin's annual Community Thanksgiving service from 6 to 7:30 p.m. Sunday. The event offers a time of celebration, thanksgiving and unity among members of Elgin-area churches. The format includes Christ-centered worship, prayers/testimonies and a brief word to stir up greater thanksgiving, unity and missional focus. Pastor Bob Whitt of Family Life Church will give the message, and Josh Thomas from Vineyard will lead the worship time. Child care will be available for very young children and a time of refreshments will be provided at the conclusion of the service. Friends of 16-year-old Jerry Martinez Jr., of Elgin, a Burlington Central High School student and avid hockey player who died in a Sept. 25 accident, will host a fundraiser in his honor on Saturday. Martinez had played for the Leafs since he was a young boy and was playing high school hockey at the Leafs Ice Centre in West Dundee. To honor Jerry, his family and his love of hockey, there will be a special two-hour rat hockey memorial from 2:30 to 4:30 p.m. Saturday at the Leafs Ice Centre, 801 Wesemann Drive, West Dundee. There will be a $10 fee per person for hockey, with all proceeds going to the Martinez family. Full equipment, including helmets, is required. For more information, call Nate at 847-471-1563. Contributions to the Jerry J. Martinez III Scholarship Fund can be sent to First Community Bank of Elgin, 165 S. Randall Road, Elgin, IL 60123. Crumpet's Tea Room, 221 W. Main St., Genoa, will host holiday teas at 3 p.m. Wednesday and at 6 p.m. Friday, Dec. 11. Tickets are $19 and are still available for both events. Reservations are required in order to attend. Pam and Jerry Semro recently became the new owners of Crumpet's. "The menu for the teas is kept a secret," Pam said, "but attendees will have two hours of having fun and being pampered. We want to have more teas more often and will try to do a monthly tea. We might have a winter tea in January and a gentlemen's tea in June in conjunction with Father's Day." For more information or to make a reservation, call Crumpet's at 815- 784-6121. Dundee Crown High School Rotary Interact Club and AVID are collecting food and pet items for the local FISH Food Pantry and Huntley (no-kill) Animal Shelter from Nov. 16 through Nov. 20 at the school, 1 Charger Country, Carpentersville, during school hours. While FISH serves many needy students from our school and families in our community, the students also want to help out homeless pets in the area and added Huntley Animal Shelter to their community giving project. Students and their families are encouraged to donate food items for people and animals alike. For more information, contact Sara Huebner, Rotary Interact adviser, or Rich Bogue, AVID adviser, at 224-484-5000. The Algonquin Area Public Library will hold its annual fall book sale today through Sunday in the basement of its branch location, 115 Eastgate Drive. The sale, run by the Friends of the Library organization, will feature more than 23,000 titles. Pricing is $1 for hard covers, 75 cents for soft covers, 50 cents for paperbacks, and 25 cents for children's books. DVDs, CDs, and video and audio tapes run 25 cents to $3. Hours for the sale are 4 to 8 p.m. today, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Saturday, and 1 to 4 p.m. Sunday. For more information, call the library at 847-458-6060. The Downtown Bartlett Business Group will host Girlslapalooza, from 4 to 9 p.m. today. Nine businesses are keeping their doors open late to offer refreshments, giveaways and discounts. Call your friends and plan your path to Pasta Mia with free bruschetta; Clique Photography and Mar-Vals with gift certificates; Bartlett Tavern, with free drink after 8 p.m.; Arts in Bartlett for Aura Photo readings, jewelry show, free wine and Zen Den Friend; Banbury Fair with free snowflake pin, Closet Boutique with free gift with purchase; Serendipity Boutique to make a free gift card holder; and Boutique Necessities & Spa by Dej for purse discounts and psychic reader. See map at www.artsinbartlett.org. For more information, e-mail the Downtown Bartlett Business Group at downtownbartlett@sbcglobal.net or call Bruce Suffren at 630-837-1727 or Debra Mills at 630-830-4040. Fox Valley Beaux Arts will hold its monthly meeting at 7 p.m. Tuesday at the Elgin Public Museum on the north side of Lords Park adjacent to the Aquatic Center. The program will examine the Art of our Native Americans as shown through their textiles, jewelry and music. It is open to the public, as well as to members and guests of Beaux Arts. For more information, call Marge Haefliger at 847-697-7374. A "Murder Mystery Night" for students in grades six through 12 will be held at Springbrook Community Church, 10115 Algonquin Road, Huntley, from 4:30 to 10 p.m. today. The event includes a dinner buffet followed by the presentation of the murder mystery and the spiritual struggles of the characters in the script. Crime investigation teams according to age work hard to solve the crime and prizes will be awarded at the close of the evening. Tickets are $10 per person or $20 per family and can be purchased at the door. For more information, call Justin Searles at 224-569-3800 Send information on your event to community news editor Julia Doyle at jdoyle@scn1.com