BONNYVILLE – Lakeland Industry and Community Association (LICA) held its first Bonnyville Fall Community Garden Market at the Bonnyville Community Garden on Sept. 21.
Families and community members gathered for a day of fun activities and fresh garden produce. The day’s activities included a pie-eating contest, a children’s art contest, craft vendors, and food trucks.
The market attracted between 75 and 100 visitors.
Stephanie Sampson, LICA's education and outreach coordinator, explained the event was meant to bring families together, while also being an opportunity to showcase the community garden.
The community garden, operated by LICA, started in 2020.
“Last year, we did a major overhaul with landscaping, so that’s where all the accessible pathways came in,” she explains. A lot of tree planting was also done.
The recent event was an opportunity to showcase the work that’s been done. A Family Fun Day was also hosted by LICA earlier this year, in June.
While the Family Fun Day served as somewhat of an open house for the garden to kick-off the growing season, the fall garden market showcased the garden in bloom and full of vegetables, closing out the season.
During the day, some garden community beds were also available for people to harvest from.
“So, we’ve had a few people picking veggies.”
The community garden also focuses on giving back to the community. Some of the produce grown this season, tended to by staff and volunteers, will be picked for the local food bank.
This year was the first year the community garden was at full capacity, seeing 41 fully booked garden plots, including both private and community plots, according to Sampson.
Sampson says LICA hopes to grow the fall event in the coming years.
“We’re hoping this is just the first annual event of this kind, and we’ll keep building it from here.”
Now, the garden beds will soon be cleaned up to prepare for the next season.
“Once the long weekend in May rolls around, that’s when we’ll open back up for next year,” says Sampson.