By Ed
On October 5th, 2025, PLEAS hosted a Lunar Mid-Autumn Festival event at the West Metro Chinese Church in Plymouth, which attracted over 150 people from the Twin Cities metro area. PLEAS (Physical Literacy Engagement Activity Service) is a nonprofit organization committed to providing exceptional learning opportunities and experiences for K-12 students to promote engagement in health and community. The event embodied this mission, serving as a family reunion, a community celebration of the fall harvest, and a place to learn about Asian culture.
The event began with outdoor activities designed to encourage physical activity for families. The church had a large open court and a nearby playground, which provided plenty of options for everyone. Basketball, soccer, and gaga ball were among the games offered.
At 5:30 p.m., everyone moved indoors for a potluck dinner. Every family brought delicious dishes or desserts to share, resulting in a long table laden with authentic Asian cuisine.
After the potluck, event facilitators Xinlai Tan and Helen Liu organized indoor activities, including board games, raffles, and mooncake-making stations. The games featured chess, where PLEAS members challenged younger kids; a game of shadow charades played behind a semi-transparent curtain, where kids learned Asian characters; and Mid-Autumn Festival-themed crafts and coloring with moons, rabbits, and lanterns. The most popular activity was mooncake-making. Families lined up to learn how to wrap their favorite fillings in a sticky rice wrap and press them into a traditional mooncake using a mold. A mother of two daughters shared, "Thank you so much for organizing the Mid-Autumn Festival event! It was my family's first time to make mooncakes during this holiday."
At the same time, PLEAS invited a college planning expert, Jenny Wang, to give a presentation on competitive high school summer camps for parents. Many parents commented that they had never known high school students should prepare several years in advance for such camps and appreciated PLEAS for providing this informational workshop.
The event concluded at 8 p.m. with an exciting raffle ticket announcement, where lucky families won prizes such as grocery vouchers, show tickets, and children's books or toys. After the event, a grandmother of two high school students told us, "I had a lot of fun meeting old and new friends and enjoying the delicious potluck food. What a successful event for families to attend! I will come again for such an event!"
All of the PLEAS student board members and their families were thrilled with the significant impact they made on the community after a few weeks of event planning. This felt like the best possible reward for us.
We appreciated our sponsors, West Metro Chinese Church, Little Dragon Chinese Summer Camp and Asian Mart!
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