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30 April 2010
Posted in
SustainaBlog
Earth Day has come and gone now.
All that are left are the fading memory and sound of children giggling and running about with garbage… well waste really, trying to decide in which bin to put it. At least that’s my memory of it…
Since my early twenties, I participated in Earth Day clean-ups. Despite the positive example this may show youngsters, picking up garbage on the side of the road with young children isn’t exactly ideal. So this year, I wanted something different, but still meaningful for Earth Day.
We decided to organize a new and more family-friendly event for Earth Day. Starting off originally as the Family Earth Day event, the name changed almost immediately to the “CRUSISIS Eco Family Event - the Saturday after Earth Day”, since people couldn’t help but associate an ‘Earth Day’ event with April 22nd.
Aside from one thing, the event itself was exactly what we hoped for. The day was picture-perfect… absolutely made to order, with sunshine, a breeze that died down just in time for the event, and smiling faces abound! I even came back with a slight sunburn, which seemed fine since it served as a reminder of being outside for hours, taking in a beautiful day and celebrating Earth Day.
There was a magic about the yard with children running around the park excited to play waste sorting games/ races, and get down and dirty with the worms from the HRM Solid Waste Resources ‘Stages of Compost’ exhibit. Iain & George got their acoustic guitars out on the grass and entertained us with some earthy tunes, as well as a few Disney favorites to the joy of the young ones listening on. Some children enjoyed a quieter scene on the deck, lying on their bellies to do some recycling activity sheets, and taking in a Patty Pitter Litter story-time.
Attendees (big and small) even took part in a fitness class hosted by Outdoor Fitness. Local Source and Namasnacks/ Counscious Catering provided INCREDIBLY delicious, healthy and local food. Several vendors &/or exhibitors took part as well, including the NS Nature Trust, beneficiary of our Eco-Charity Draw, and Adsum House for Mothers & Children, who received the remaining items from our “Drop & Swap Corner” for baby & children items. To cap it off, children ate up tales from “Eddie’s Litterless Road Tour”, Clean NS’s puppet show presented in P-3 schools around NS. And even the little power we did use (to power a couple display laptops and light the indoor puppet show and kitchen use), was green-powered by Bullfrog Power.
It truly was a fun, green family-friendly event. However the “one thing” missing was more attendees. You could argue that weekend activities kept some families away. But weekends are better if you’re planning a family event. You could question whether the event was well promoted, although we heard from many that it had been. And although more promotion could always be done, one would think that the following should have been enough to warrant a somewhat larger crowd:
- Promotion by The Coast and haligonia.ca
- 2 press releases to the newspapers & radio broadcasters the weeks leading up to the event
- Web promotion
- Posters plastered around the city, and event handouts in green and family-friendly locations such as cafes, markets, libraries, schools, earth-friendly vendors & sustainable stores, etc…
- Direct marketing by sustainable groups such as the Nova Scotia Nature Trust, the College of Sustainability and others to their community networks
- Direct mail-outs targeting over 1,000 local young families and hundreds of sustainable organizations and businesses the weeks leading up to the event
- Hundreds of mini printouts about the event handed out at the market, to young families; etc…
Many wonderful families participated. And to them, a huge THANK YOU for your support and enthusiasm. From what I was told (and could see), they all seemed to have a lot of ‘green’ fun for Earth Weekend, so I was happy about that. However, there is a financial reality to hosting events such as this, as well as to providing FREE sustainable living resources like the many on-line services by CRUSISIS Sustainable Living, which are funded in part by events such as this.
Oddly enough, we suggest the attendance could have been higher even thought a representative from JUDES and Halifax Fusion, who attended with her family congratulated us on the great turn-out. When we thanked her a little surprised, she said many times their events only get a handful of families at the most.
So we suggest more attendees would have been better, not only on our behalf, but on behalf of other sustainably-minded organizations trying to make a difference who also need your support. Ultimately, in order for more such events to be presented, whether it is by us, or other sustainable living organizations, we, as a community, need to rally more to make time and priority to attend them, in order to ensure we can continue to enjoy more of them in the future…
Scroll through our Sustainable Events Calendar for lots of worthy events going on in your community this season.
Thoughtfully,
Sylvie
CRUSISIS Sustainable Living
Sylvie is the Founder of CRUSISIS Sustainable Living. She is an engineer, currently staying at home to raise her young children, and managing the operations of CRUSISIS. CRUSISIS is your on-line and community-based resource for sustainable living in the greater Halifax area and beyond. Visit us at www.crusisis.ca to find out how to make your lifestyle a little more sustainable, every day... for People, Planet & Community.
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