Photo: Lisa Bryan, KP News
The Key Peninsula Civic Center board hired Stefanie Warren as the new marketing and facility coordinator, replacing retirement-bound Patty Ghiossi after a successful three-year run in the position. Essential to the smooth functioning of the civic center, the role includes responsibility for such time-honored events as the popular Civic Center Crab Feed, KP Livable Community Fair and the Winter Warmup & Holiday Craft Fair. Warren will handle marketing and provide coordination for all building rentals to organizations, groups, families and individuals.
Longtime KPCC board member Peggy Gablehouse, who handles human resources for the organization, said, “Stefanie is very warm and open. I think she’s going to do very well.”
When Warren saw the job advertised, she said it felt almost too good to be true. “I was looking for ways to continue supporting my dreams financially without going back to the world of cubicles and shareholders.”
She is a seasoned world traveler with over 36,100 miles to her credit.
Her childhood dream of becoming an actress was fulfilled early on. She appeared on stage at the Silverdale Community Theatre in grade through high school. After graduating from Central Kitsap High School in Silverdale, she toured with a professional acting troupe from Chicago. After that first year, Warren said she realized, “It was not what I wanted to do with my life.”
Professionally she moved onto event planning in the Seattle area, an occupation she enjoyed for seven years. Two noteworthy experiences included planning a Microsoft Christmas party with 400 casino tables at the Four Seasons Hotel; working for Events Northwest she coordinated 88 Christmas parties in December 2000.
Warren later earned a bachelor of science in health psychology and spirituality from Bastyr University. She is not bashful about being a druid and is an active member of The Order of Bards, Ovates and Druids. The group is active in Washington state, not just England. She enjoys sharing her knowledge of druidry.
After 10 years of performing operational management for Philips Healthcare in Bothell, Warren was seduced by wanderlust and left her steady job to travel the world.
Her solo trip, three years in the making, lasted six months. She visited 33 countries, including a visit with a cousin in Tasmania, where her grandmother once lived.
In 2017, Warren bought a motorhome and traveled the states, before eventually settling down. She and her partner, Dave, are developing their homestead on 4 1/2 acres in Longbranch. At the moment, that means living in two motorhomes, while awaiting the electrical, septic and well permitting processes with the county.
Warren said she feels fortunate to work in nearby Vaughn. And she is thrilled to have the opportunity to do work she enjoys, while meeting new people and becoming part of the community at the same time. “People have been so warm and friendly, ” she said. “It feels like home, and we’re only getting started.”
Besides a large garden, they plan to raise goats, chickens, bees and other small farm animals. The couple shares their home with two motorcycle-sidecar-riding border collies. Between the two of them, they have six pet sugar gliders—pocket-sized marsupials originally from the rainforests of Australia and Indonesia, now bred domestically as household pets. Warren said, “We love our sugar gliders! That is what brought us together.”
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