Fall Festival cements the season in Caribou

There’s no way to deny it any longer…fall is officially here to stay.  Despite some warm daytime highs over the last couple weeks, the nightly lows are impossible to ignore, and the many of the area’s leaves are already starting their turn to the colorful.  This year’s Fall Festival event at downtown City Park in Soda Springs celebrated the changing of the season with a mixture of activities, games, vendors, and company.

Chelsey Davids, City employee and one of the organizers of the event, explained that due to the construction project on Main street, the event was relocated to the city park.  In some ways, though, the change may have been fortuitous.  “I don’t think we would have been able to fit all of the vendors on Main Street,” she said.

Along with retail vendors of art, jewelry, clothing, accessories, health and beauty products, bird houses, and many other items, the total of more than 40 booths included the Citizens for Soda Springs School District Bond group, the Center for Hope South, EF Student Travelers of Caribou County, a Fun Run motorcycle ride to raise funds for school lunches, and much more.

“It’s a perfect day,” Davids said.  “The weather has been amazing, and things have gone great!”  Bouncy slides were set up for the kids, supervised by students raising money for prom, and at the other end of the spectrum, a beer garden set up was hosted by Stockman’s at the end of the food truck line.  

Hope Hansen, in addition to her job as the Library Director Hope Hansen was on hand to collect donations for “Cuddle Bear” books and teddy bears for the Caribou Medical Center in support of Childhood Cancer Awareness Month, which many local schools and organizations have been recognizing throughout September.  The books and bears will be delivered to the hospital sometime during October.

Local historian and Caribou Historical Society member Bill Horsley was on site selling a variety of handcrafted birdhouses, which he has been crafting and decided to bring down to the Festival.

The motorcycle Fun Run was organized by Jeremy Peace, and riders collected donations from various locations along the route to use toward paying off lunch balances for local students.  Food insecurity can be a major issue for families everywhere, but as much as possible the goal was to make school a place where that would not have to be an issue.

The Citizens for Soda Springs School District Bond is composed of a number of local parents who support the bond to build a new high school to replace the current building, as reported in last week’s paper.  The group is not directly affiliated with the school district, although many of its members work for or have worked for local schools, and many have also attended those schools as well.  Alexis Ericsson related a number of stories about facilities issues at the current school building, as did other members of the group who were in the park to help share their message.  The group can be found on Facebook and Instagram under the name Citizens for Soda Springs School District Bond.  Mark Kirby can be reached at 208-339-2597 for more information as well.

EF Student Travelers of Caribou County was organized by Courtney Stanley this year, and was in the park to help raise funds for students to participate in an upcoming educational tour to France, Germany, and Switzerland during the next Spring Break.      

Erika Dannelly, representing Caribou Medical Center, was also enjoying the weather and not promoting anything specific on Saturday, although there are plans in October to re-imagine the traditional Breast Cancer Brake for Breakfast event as a breakfast during which the public could meet with providers and have a discussion along with their breakfast.  More details will be forthcoming as the event gets finalized.

Music was a backdrop to the day’s events, and led into the night-time dance that took place in the park in the cooling, but still perfectly pleasant weather.

All in all, the Fall Festival event was fitting to the time of year—thoughtful, mild-mannered, fun, and with a bit of a fall snap.