Pipestone Flyer
This area resident's lap was the perfect napping spot for a tiny piglet in the petting zoo as she watches a duck waddle by with it's own naturally grown party hat on during New Sarepta's Canada Day celebration.
New Sarepta might not be as instantly recognizable and easy to pick out on a map as say Edmonton or Calgary, but when it comes to community spirit New Sarepta is definitely playing in the big leagues.
Traditionally this hamlet puts on its own Canada Day celebration but with a bit of a twist. They don't want to wait until the actual day so they get their party hats on early and celebrate the Saturday before July 1st. This year was no exception.
Beginning at 4:00pm Centre St., which runs in front of Yardley Jones Park, is blocked off between 1 St. N. and 2 St. S. and opened only to foot traffic, with numerous vendors and entertainment set up along the street.
The hamlet's only restaurant, the New Sarepta Market, even shut down for the afternoon and decorated up a little pergola in the park with red and white streamers and sold fresh baked goods, fresh vegetables, drinks and treats to all the hungry families attending the festivities. The County also had a massive BBQ set up and there were burgers and hot dogs available to nosh on.
Stalls lining Centre Street had all sorts of hand made baubles and knick knacks for sale including bird houses, wooden whirly-gigs that spun in the wind, ice cream, Ukrainian food, jewellery, and of course, the official New Sarepta calendars!
Kids were walking around with fantastic balloon creations on their heads made by a balloon artist in the Kids Zone and they were also taking full advantage of the large bouncy house that was set up across from the park. A petting zoo on the corner was extremely popular with everyone, and the stunning team of black horses pulling a big wagon decorated with fluttering Canadian flags was packed full of families for each circuit of the hamlet that they did.
Singer Brendan Guy was brought in to entertain for the evening and he had the kids dancing and singing along with his set of popular cover songs. One little girl was even brave enough to go up front to sing a duet with Brendan but once in front of the crowd she was struck silent by stage fright, so she ended up just standing there with Brendan and smiling as he sang to her.
Despite having, in the words of area Councillor Jocelyn Mackay, "The BEST fireworks display around!" Attendance at this year's Canada Day celebration was fairly low. There seemed to be a bit of confusion by the public as to the actual day of the party, with people thinking the New Sarepta celebration was taking place on Monday due to a lack of advertising for the event.
In spite of this glitch, the people who did make it out to New Sarepta on Saturday for their pre-Canada Day party had a great time and will be sure to tell their friends next year to come on down and celebrate Canada twice!