For a second consecutive year, the Arts Project of Cherry Grove (APCG) brought its Casino, with a theme of “Into the Woods,” to Whyte Hall, in Fire Island Pines, as part of the Pines Party, this year entitled “Once Upon a Pines Party,” and held on July 30.
The dress code was “Storybook” and, staffing the Texas Hold ’Em Poker table, roulette wheel, and other card games and games of chance, as well as the beer, soda, water and coffee bar, we came as Robin Hood, Goldilocks and Bears, Little Red Riding Hood, Sleeping Beauty, a bird, a satyr, a nun, Pierrot, an elf, Queens, of course, and, draped in foliage, the woods themselves.
We received visits from three little pigs, in butcher’s aprons and, buns to the wind, nothing else; four dwarves: Scruffy, Shady, Flirty and Hateful; Kings and Queens and knights; Maleficent and her raven; fairies; pirates; Pooh; and boys ready for bed and toting stuffed animals.
The “Into the Woods” Casino raised funds for the Fire Island Pines Property Owners Association (FIPPOA) Charitable Foundation, the Stonewall Community Foundation, and APCG, and was coordinated by Hal Hayes and Jon Gilbert, from the Pines, and Michael Coffindaffer and Troy Files, from the Grove.
APCG will hold a Casino night, at the Cherry Grove Community House, on September 10, following the Miss Fire Island pageant at the Grove Hotel/Ice Palace.