News
Visitors' Guide
ENLARGE
On Friday, July 15, The Children's Festival will return to Pioneer Park in Nevada City, and the park will once again be transformed into a lively Renaissance Faire for children. This year's festival will include strolling minstrels, face-painters, a bridge-guarding troll, a bagpiper, town crier, medieval fencing, catapults, the Knight and Lady, Queen Elizabeth, Penney the Clown and Claude and the life-sized mechanical dragon. This year, for the first time, members of Wildlife Rehabilitation and Release will arrive in costume with several of their birds including a red-tail hawk, kestrel, barn owl, crow and great horned owl.
There will be over twenty arts and crafts tables where children are able to make their own costumes, swords, shields and magic wands, and engage in wood block construction, soapstone carving and clay modeling and paint a cardboard medieval castle. Children can spend the day being creative and being entertained, and leave in full costume with a bag overflowing with their own creations.
Founded in 1971 by Pat Cobler and Ilse Barnhart, the Children's Festival continued as an annual summer event for 19 years. In 2003, at the memorial service for Ilse Barnhart, four individuals decided that it was time to bring back the enchanting Renaissance craft faire that was so beloved in the 1970s and 80s. Pat Cobler, Lew Sitzer, Susan Barry and Gayle Martin organized a group of volunteers with Gayle acting as Festival Director.
Gayle Martin has been involved with the Children's Festival since the early 1980s, when she enjoyed the morning session with her young children and worked the evening session at the macaroni necklace table. From the beginning, she was dazzled by this wonderful and magical community event and as festival director it has been a large and important presence in her life. She has worked hard to grow the event and maintain the magic and has succeeded in making this uniquely Nevada County event a highlight of the summer. This year she will be stepping down and believes she has found the perfect successor in Karen Nelson.
Karen first attended The Children's Festival with her mother, Nancy Sauers, when she was just 8-years-old. She still remembers the costumes and music, the wonderful town crier and the lemons with peppermint. She has worked at the tunics table every year since 2004, with her Mom and daughter, Natalie (who will be her assistant this year in her new position as Festival Director). Her favorite thing about the Festival truly is to look up from the task at hand and see a world transformed.
Last year over 1600 children and adults attended The Children's Festival. Children with fond memories of the original festivals are now bringing their own children while the moms who started the whole thing are bringing their grandchildren. This home-grown event is a celebration of creativity and community spirit and gives the children an opportunity to enjoy a day of hands-on fun and to explore their imaginations. Over 200 volunteers make this unique event possible, and it also made possible by the generous support of many local businesses and is sponsored by the Nevada City Rotary Club.
There will be over twenty arts and crafts tables where children are able to make their own costumes, swords, shields and magic wands, and engage in wood block construction, soapstone carving and clay modeling and paint a cardboard medieval castle. Children can spend the day being creative and being entertained, and leave in full costume with a bag overflowing with their own creations.
Founded in 1971 by Pat Cobler and Ilse Barnhart, the Children's Festival continued as an annual summer event for 19 years. In 2003, at the memorial service for Ilse Barnhart, four individuals decided that it was time to bring back the enchanting Renaissance craft faire that was so beloved in the 1970s and 80s. Pat Cobler, Lew Sitzer, Susan Barry and Gayle Martin organized a group of volunteers with Gayle acting as Festival Director.
Gayle Martin has been involved with the Children's Festival since the early 1980s, when she enjoyed the morning session with her young children and worked the evening session at the macaroni necklace table. From the beginning, she was dazzled by this wonderful and magical community event and as festival director it has been a large and important presence in her life. She has worked hard to grow the event and maintain the magic and has succeeded in making this uniquely Nevada County event a highlight of the summer. This year she will be stepping down and believes she has found the perfect successor in Karen Nelson.
Karen first attended The Children's Festival with her mother, Nancy Sauers, when she was just 8-years-old. She still remembers the costumes and music, the wonderful town crier and the lemons with peppermint. She has worked at the tunics table every year since 2004, with her Mom and daughter, Natalie (who will be her assistant this year in her new position as Festival Director). Her favorite thing about the Festival truly is to look up from the task at hand and see a world transformed.
Last year over 1600 children and adults attended The Children's Festival. Children with fond memories of the original festivals are now bringing their own children while the moms who started the whole thing are bringing their grandchildren. This home-grown event is a celebration of creativity and community spirit and gives the children an opportunity to enjoy a day of hands-on fun and to explore their imaginations. Over 200 volunteers make this unique event possible, and it also made possible by the generous support of many local businesses and is sponsored by the Nevada City Rotary Club.
