Helping out: Mrs. Moses Lake hopes to be of service anywhere she can
Newly crowned Mrs. Moses Lake 2021 Jennifer Rogerson stands along the shore of Moses Lake.
Charles H. Featherstone/Columbia Basin Herald
MOSES LAKE — Jennifer Rogerson is emphatic that she doesn’t mind getting older.
“I relish it,” Rogerson, a self-confessed stay-at-home mother of five, said.
Rogerson, 42, was named Mrs. Moses Lake on Aug. 14, and will hold the title until next year’s Mrs. Washington America Pageant, all part of the Mrs. America Pageant.
“This year, there were only 11 contestants, but we were lucky to have a pageant,” said Pam Curnel, state director of the Mrs. Washington America Pageant and herself both a former Miss Moses Lake and Mrs. Washington.
“It’s all about empowering women to make a difference in the community,” Curnel said. “It’s not just about a crown and a sash.”
But Rogerson has earned her crown and sash, and she hopes to use the visibility it will give her to help promote community service and raise money for worthy local causes like special education in the public schools, the Moses Lake Food Bank and the Columbia Basin Cancer Foundation.
Having lived in Grant County for 17 years, Rogerson said she “really enjoys helping out,” and has been a substitute teacher, volunteered at New Hope, where she helped with the late night intakes, was a paraeducator focusing on special needs kids in the Ephrata schools, and even made Space Burgers for the Lions Club at the Grant County Fair.
Mostly, though, she’s a stay-at-home mom right now.
“I like being out with my kids and taking them places,” Rogerson said. “They’re a lot of fun.”
Rogerson also said that for the last ten years, she’s been a professional make-up artist, doing stage makeup and makeup for weddings and baby showers.
“I like the art behind it,” she said. “A person is a blank canvas, and I build onto that. I love color, and it makes me excited.”
So if you see someone out and about with a sash and crown, it’s probably Rogerson, doing her part to make life a little better.
“Anywhere that I am of service,” she said.
Charles H. Featherstone can be reached at cfeatherstone@columbiabasinherald.com.