A big day of celebrations in Carnduff for Canada Day

Family activities and entertainment were offered for the public as part of the Canada Day celebrations at the Carnduff Memorial Park.

Choose Life Ministry accepted the responsibility for organizing the festivities, and came through with an afternoon of activities. Chrys Spittall, who is part of Chose Life’s board, said it was a great afternoon in the town, and about 200-250 people were in attendance.

“It was very busy,” she said. “There was lots of people there and they had a nice relaxing family time.”

This year marked the first time that Choose Life has run the event.

“Everything ran smoothly on the day. Of course there will be a few things that we will look at that we could tweak to make it run a bit better, but overall we’re very happy about how the day went and it fell into place.”

Activities included bouncy castles, free swimming and food vendors throughout the day. Other attractions included hair braiding, a raffle, a loonie auction, a tractor pull and a toonie cake walk.

Live music featuring a variety of bands, including some from the Carnduff area, ran during the afternoon and evening.

“The music was absolutely awesome,” Spittall said. “It was a local family here, the Szakacs family, and they have a band call Curtis and Bonnie and Family, and they had a really good performance.”

Among the other bands was Revelation from Nipawin who came and performed.

Several local acts were also part of the festivities.

“People sat and really enjoyed that,” said Spittall.

A pulled pork supper was served from 4-6:30 p.m.

“We had 150 supper tickets and they all sold out and people wanted more,” said Spittall.

Fireworks began at dusk. They were able to get the fireworks off before a powerful thunderstorm rumbled through the area.

“The fireworks were very good,” she said.

Not was the event a great way to celebrate Canada’s 152nd birthday, but the festivities also created awareness about the ministry, which has a home for young women with life-controlling issues in the Gainsborough area.

“Now I think everybody knows who we are now and what we’re doing, and I think it was well-received,” said Spittall.

The ministry has received a lot of positive feedback from people who said they enjoyed the day, the relaxing atmosphere and the family focus.

Spittall said the ministry won’t commit to whether it would organize Canada Day in Carnduff again, but if they did, there are some things they would do differently, despite the success of the day.

They’ll have to have a meeting and go to the board to discuss the future of the event.  

A lot of work went into preparing for the event, as they started working on it in March to find enough volunteers, secure bands to play music and locate sponsors.

“There is quite a bit of work put in that people don’t see,” she said.

Proceeds of Canada Day will be directed towards Choose Life’s efforts to help young women.