"Arts on the Fly"

For those of you involved with non-profit organizations, you will know that the Fall season usually means Annual General Meeting time. Even in our little town, this is the case. To give you a bit of a rundown on the various clubs/groups/activities in town, I thought I would write out a little list...

• The Community Club - recently had their AGM, they are responsible for monthly Bingo, a children's Halloween party with fireworks!, the Old Fashioned Christmas potluck dinner, the New Years dance and the May Day parade.
  
• The Historical Society - run the museum in town (yes we have a museum!)
  
• PAC - Parent Advisory Council- Horsefly School
  
• Exercise classes - a local massage therapist runs gentle movement classes and muscle sculpting and cardio classes out of her clinic
  
• Dancing - dance instruction is provided at the community hall for children including ballet, jazz and a boys hiphop and for adults there is jazz.
  
• Fencing - offered at the school, once a week throughout the fall/winter
  
• Fall Fair Committee - committee that coordinates the annual fall fair in August
  
• Quilt Club - quilters meet once per month through fall/winter
• Arts on the Fly committee - annual music, arts and dance festival in Horsefly...more on this to follow...
  

And the surprising thing is I may have missed some. It is pretty incredible what this little community has to offer. With all of these activities I decided I had to prioritize what I would become involved in. This year I decided that PAC would be a good idea, since the girls are just starting out in the school. Next, I decided it was high time I got myself into some form of exercise and I know it will be difficult over the winter, so I decided to try the exercise classes...so that is two times per week. Then finally, I thought just for fun, I would get involved with the Arts on the Fly Festival. So a little bit about that...

We missed the festival last year as it was scheduled on the same week-end as the Zirnhelt Family Reunion ( which we definitely didn't want to miss!). But we did see the stage and the preparations for the festival and it looks like a first class affair. This is the third year of the festival, which is run completely by volunteers and was created by a handful of Horseflinnians who had a vision of an event which would both promote tourism in the area and fulfill their zeal for All Things Creative. As I think we have mentioned before, the Cariboo is an interesting mix of cowboys, farmers and artists and Horsefly is certainly not short on talent. Many of the performers and exhibitors are local but the festival also features other musicians and artists from BC, across Canada and internationally like last year from Argentina.

So mark your calendars...this year's festival is set for the week-end of July 3rd and 4th. Hope to see you there!

PS Speaking of local artists...I came across this site in my travels Inspired by Imagination which is Florian Krumsiek's site, his photography is gorgeous...my favourite is the bales of hay in the mist...check it out!