We are still High on Ice!

Perhaps you would like to join us for a day of fun with ice - we hope you say yes! Come join us in “Finding your Creative Spirit”. All interested people are encouraged to attend, artistic ability or not, we will help you find your ability and spirit within.

The Fort St. John Community Arts Council in partnership with the City of Fort St. John present: the FSJ Ice Carving Workshop "Finding your Creative Spirit” on Saturday, February 11, 2012 at Centennial Park form 9 amd to 4 pm. Registration is only $25 and lunch is provided.

Instructor Jesse Forrester FSJs professional carving competitor for three consecutive years. He was born and raised in the Peace and has lead the local High On Ice team for the last five years in park and site preparations. He is an artist by hobby and a successful entrepreneur by trade. Jesse promises to provide hands on techniques and ice loads of fun.

Instructor Sonja Butts is one of FSJs most recognized artists and the local and professional judge for High On Ice for two consecutive years. She was born and raised in the Peace and has added to the beauty to our community with her art and continues to showcase her pieces. She is an artist at heart and a Director of the FSJ Community Arts Council. Sonja promises to share carving tips and help awaken your spirit with your artistic creations.

The registration deadline is Thursday, February 9th, 2012 so get your forms in and unlease your creative spirit on the ice!

Family Fun in the Sun Week is here again! The Week is running from August 17^th to August 21^st and here are some of the awesome events you can check out!

Thousands of people, 750 horse-drawn wagon rides, a 15-building cowboy town, colossal dance floor, live music and comedy, a dozen massive air toys, 200+ volunteers, 1000’s of Root Beer floats and hotdogs, and everything absolutely FREE?! It might sound too good to be true, but it’s not, and it happened June 18 in Centennial Park. Many would say it was Fort St. John’s party of the year.

We get asked every year why we do it. What follows was written on the reverse side of an information card that we handed out during the event:

Many people ask us why we would put on an event like this. Well, we love throwing first-class parties - 2-steppin’, BBQ’n, and all! But more than that, we have a dream for our city that includes SELFLESS love, overflowing JOY, deep CONTENTMENT, relentless KINDNESS, VIBRANT homes, and abundant LIFE!! And Party in the Park is a small way of living out that dream!

I believe each one of us is the recipient of sheer undeserved grace! I woke up this morning to brilliant sunshine, I breathed in the crisp morning air (for free), my heart is working (seemingly without my telling it too), somebody dropped off a Timmy’s coffee for me (random kindness), I was born into a prosperous country (didn’t plan that) and make my living off oil in the ground (didn’t put it there). Sheer grace, outrageous generosity everywhere!

At Evangel, we feel that our response to this undeserved grace should be, at the very least, to “go and do likewise”. Freely we have received, so freely we give. And it won’t be the last time either! Our hope and prayer is that this spirit of selfless love and extravagant generosity catches on and becomes something much more everyday in our beautiful city.

This quote was shared in our church one Sunday and I think it sums up our primary motivating factor for Party in the Park.

Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around.

It is that time of year again - party time! Join us this Saturday, June 18th at Centennial Park from 4 - 8 pm, for a fun family evening at Party in the Park.  We’ll have food and drinks, gigantic air toys, a kids carnival,  live music, a massive outdoor dance floor for two-stepping, karaoke, petting zoo, wagon rides, an even bigger Cowboy Town, and absolutely NO COST! 

Show off your talent at the Cowboy Town Idol (Karaoke) and win great prizes and a chance to perform in front of the big crowd during the Country Hoedown that goes 'till dark! 

Party in the Park is an annual event held at Centennial Park in Fort St. John, B.C. It is truly the gala of the year, ranking as one of the largest events on the Fort St. John calendar!  What really blows people away is that there is no charge for anything, no hidden gimmicks, no strings attached.  Everything is free!

Check out Party in the Park at Centennial Park, this Saturday, 4 - 8 pm, brought to you by Evangel Chapel & Company.

Also, Party in the Park is currently looking for face-painting volunteers! If you've got talent turning faces into butterflies and tigers and you want to get involved with the biggest party in town, call Sara Warriner at 250-793-4817 or send her an email at  This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . 

I once heard a tale of a pastor who filled his church by doing family dances.  My reaction to the story was one of scepticism and incredulity.   So how did we get to the place where dancing has become a normal part of the social scene at Evangel Chapel? 

For me it goes way back (well, a little way back) to my wife and I attending wedding receptions.   Of course we never danced, having grown up in a fairly staunch environment where dancing was considered one of the ills of our time and for the most part - forbidden fruit.   So there we would sit, looking on with a sense of “I’m-missing-out”.   Happily, our story doesn’t end here. 

A few years ago, we were invited to attend one of the Pomeroy Barn dances, and was I in for a surprise!   On a warm summer evening, we walked into that old barn, packed with young people of all ages.   With “Fishin’ in  the Dark” piping through the PA, the atmosphere was electric as 120 people milled around the dance floor, doing what we do best in the Peace – country two-stepping!   I saw something that day that was wholesome, family-friendly, and loads of fun.  I would soon meet the wonderful gal behind the concept: Angelica Pomeroy (affectionately known around our church as “Angie, the dance lady”).

Angie, along with her husband Mike, is a long-time resident of Fort St. John who has always loved to dance.  When they moved out to the family farm with the big old dairy barn, she saw a vision that had nothing to do with a milking parlour.  They started small in 1993 with barn dances in the loft and over time this would grow to several dances being held throughout the year, drawing crowds of people from the Fort St. John area.   Angie’s dream is to bring family dancing back into the life of the community - for sociability, fun, and exercise.

Angie teaches lessons in the Big Green Barn on occasion, leads dance for social and community events, and presents week long dance residencies in local elementary schools.   Her repertoire includes folk and international dances, children's dances, along with some 'local favourites':  2-step, polka, waltz, and schottische to name a few.   She leads many 'mixer dances' to make sure it is a 'social' event, as well as teaches 'dance etiquette'.

This year at Party in the Park (June 18, Centennial Park), Angie will be leading a team of 25 dancers that will give live illustration to many of the dances that have become favourites at Evangel Chapel.  Then we’ll break out into one of the biggest “barn dances” of the year!          

Hey all you young dancers! I'm offering some country and 'mixer' dance lessons in the Pomeroy Barn on the next two Tuesday evenings, June 7 and June 14, 7:30 - 9 pm.

Each year, the City of Fort St. John hosts a Community Planting Day where we invite local residents to Centennial Park to assist us in transplanting flowers to the beds in the park. This event is designed for all ages, though it tends to be mostly school aged children.

This year we had students from Baldonnel Elementary volunteering.  This is an event that contributes to beautifying the community and assists the City’s Public Works staff in their annual spring planting.

Good job to all the students from Baldonnel Elementary who volunteered - the park looks awesome!

Let’s decide on a vision. An important component of the Official Community Plan (OCP) is the Vision Statement.  This statement outlines what the community wants to be in the future.  Ideally the vision statement should be a source of inspiration and answer the following questions:

1. “What do we do?”

2. “For whom do we do it?”

3. “How do we excel?”

During the past four years a number of vision statements have been crafted for our community.  We need to decide which one statement is best suited to be the guiding light of our OCP.  Before the city goes to the community to vote on their preferred statement, we wanted to run through the options and give people a chance to comment or change the statements.

Look for us at Municipal Government Day on May 25th, 3:00pm to 8:00pm in Centennial Park, to share your thoughts.  We will also be hosting two open house sessions for community members to come and discuss the vision statements.  These sessions will be held at the Pomeroy Sports Center on Thursday, June 9th from 6:00pm to 9:00pm and Saturday, June 11th from 1:00pm to 3:00pm.

Keep an eye out later in June for your chance to vote on the vision that best exemplifies what we want Fort St. John to be!

The Flower Pot Auction is on May 28th at Centennial Park.  Pots will be on view at noon and the auction starts at 1:00. Children can paint their own pot and get their face painted before the auction starts!

Here's another reason to be excited for Canada Day in Fort St. John...

Brian MacMillan will be the headliner for the celebrations in Centennial Park!

Here's the schedule of events:

10:00am: Parade marshalling at North Peace Arena
10:00am - 4:00pm: Classic Cruisers Show & Shine on 100 Street
11:00am - 12:00pm: Canada Day Parade
12:00pm - 4:00pm: "Celebrations in the Park" in Centennial Park (including "Art In the Park")
8:00pm - 10:00pm: "Music Under the Stars" - jam session and open mic in Centennial Park
10:00pm(ish): Fireworks - watch them from Centennial Park!
10:00pm - 11:30pm: Brian Macmillan Performance in Centennial Park

Enjoy a magical display of fireworks and then let MacMillan serenade you under the stars!