“I think everyone has had a great time and we’ve had a wonderful turnout,” said Natalie Sass, president of the Lone Butte Community Association.
Around 200 hundred people stopped by the Lone Butte Craft Fair at the Community Hall on Dec. 2, where roughly 18 or so vendors sold products from baked goods to candy to recycled goods. Organizer and newcomer to Lone Butte Carmen Dykstra was saddled with the putting the fair together.
“I had some pretty big shoes to fill, it was a kind of scary task,” she said.
She took it in stride, using a book supplied to her by previous organizers. The book had the names of vendors from last year, so Dykstra picked up the phone and started cold calling. Some vendors called her as well, which prompted her to create a waiting list in case someone cancelled. Some vendors did cancel allowing Dykstra, who only moved to the area last Christmas Eve, to fit people from the wait list in.
Dykstra also had her own table, specializing in recycled products such as a Santa decoration made of toilet paper rolls and what looked like a mop head.
“I like using stuff I would normally throw away and try to keep it out of the dump,” she explained. “A lot of recycled projects you find laying around the house, I like to reuse, recycle and just create.”
Some of the challenges Dykstra faced while putting the event together weren’t too bad, she said. Most of it was keeping on top of promotional details and finding out what products the merchants were peddling so she could keep them separate from each other. In addition to the planning, it took three hours to decorate the hall.
Patrons of the fair were also able to win free products through door prizes. The booty was donated by different vendors and given out to people quickest to answer questions such as “who is the only husband who willingly came?”
Dykstra has some exciting plans to expand the event next year like making it more of a Christmas village, though she admits it might be a tough endeavour and it hasn’t been discussed with anyone else yet.
“It would be nice if we could set up outside and do like hot chocolate, more things outside and have more Christmas lights,” she said.
“I’d love to do that one day but I don’t think many people would be willing to stay outside and freeze.”