Who says you need experience to serve a fine breakfast?

Olivia Haft, Sarina Thomas, and Estelle Haft (hidden) cut up the pastries to be served at breakfast.

Three Tappan Middle School girls. Three Forsythe Middle School girls.

One smooth breakfast service.

For six girls who had never served at The Breakfast at St. Andrew’s, they sure were efficient, productive, and delivered a wonderful Saturday morning meal to nearly 70 guests at the downtown Ann Arbor church. Several guests made a point to stop by and thank the girls for their service following the meal.

But beyond providing an opportunity to serve, these events offer students an honest glimpse into their community.

“I was surprised by how many people needed a breakfast,” said Tappan eighth grader Megan Faunce. “I didn’t know …”

The lines were long Saturday morning, but Megan and Lily Soldan were ready. The girls were the first to greet breakfast patrons, holding a ladle, a smile, and a choice: oatmeal or grits.

Forsythe sixth graders Sarina Thomas, and sisters Estelle and Olivia Haft managed the baked goods and juice flawlessly, even if some of the crumb cake wound up being rather, um, crumbly. Sarina and Olivia must have done a great job dishing out the baked goods, because their trays were empty by the time breakfast ended.

Estelle did an equally splendid job of not only making sure there were varieties of juices offered, but she planned it nearly perfect so that there were very few leftovers cups of juice (She was warned she may have to drink all the leftovers).

After a brief tutorial from Anna’s Kindness co-host Kate Lewit, Tappan eighth grader Lizzie Kinsey did a terrific job pouring out coffee for guests.

The girls were not only terrific greeters and servers, but great listeners as well. All of them had lively, funny chats with the guests (including one story about a large African pet cat that would steal Legos and hide them under furniture), which seemed to brighten the mornings for both.

When breakfast ended, the girls wiped down the tables, put up the chairs, put away the clean dishes, threw out the garbage, cleaned and recycled the plastics, and refilled the cereal … leaving the kitchen as spotless as they found it.

Thank you to Linda and Mark, who are always terrific kitchen leaders for Anna’s Kindness volunteers. Thank you also to Anna’s Kindness board member Kate Lewit, for helping co-host the event.

#randomactsofanna