Writing fest comes to Lynn Valley Library

Readers of all stripes will find something to look forward to at the 2013 North Shore Writers Festival, which is being hosted this year at Lynn Valley Library on Friday, April 19 and Saturday, April 20.

Included in the line-up of visiting authors are Helen Humphreys, award-winning Canadian author of novels such as The Reinvention of Love and Coventry, humourist Terry Fallis, Toronto writer Tanis Rideout, and local poet Evelyn Lau. At other times in weekend,  a panel of writers will discuss the publishing process, while another will explore the delectable world of food writing.

New this year is a Friday evening Literary Trivia Night, hosted by author and CBC radio personality Grant Lawrence. Register your own team of six, or come prepared to join an impromptu team on the spot, and engage in a friendly battle with other lit lovers.

Click here for the festival website, and be sure to take advantage of having these interesting events happening right on our doorstep! All activities will take place in the Community Room adjacent to Lynn Valley Library.

Advent of spring means LV Day coming soon!

Happy Spring, everyone! Snowdrops and crocuses are currently doing their annual warm-up act for the daffs and tulips that will soon be putting on a show.

But they aren’t the only ones busy doing their thing. The organizers of the annual Lynn Valley Days community celebration have already been at work getting the stage set for this popular event, so here’s a heads up of what you need to know!

  • First off, tickets for the Friday night gala dinner dance, set for May 24th, go on sale beginning Sunday, March 24th. This has been a sold-out success for the past two years, and tickets move fast, so get yours now! All details are here.
  • All the world loves a parade, so start planning your entry now. All the parade details and application forms are available in our Lynn Valley Days section, along with contact details for this year’s parade marshal, Gillian Konst.
  • Lynn Valley Days is the North Shore’s longest-running festival, and one of its most popular. And it doesn’t just happen by magic! Please pitch in by becoming a sponsor or volunteer. Neighbours helping neighbours makes the world go ’round

Leave space in the garden for Project Sunflower

Last fall, those of us at LynnValleyLife HQ had a great time reading the nominations for our first-annual Good Neighbour Award, which wrapped up at the end of December. In fact, we had such a good time, we realized we’d need another fun community initiative to keep us busy until the contest kicks off again in November!

So we put our heads together to plan a new neighbourhood undertaking – and we’re calling it Project Sunflower! We’re asking people to jump on board and plant one, two or a whole patch of sunflowers in their front gardens this spring. Wouldn’t it be great to drive (or walk, or bike) through the neighbourhood, and see hundreds of sunflowers brightening our yards and streets as summer progresses?

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Wintry weather perfect for library book sale

Don’t let the rain and cold get you down – that’s perfect weather for book-browsing!

The Friends of the Library are having their semi-annual book sale this weekend, from Feb. 22 to 24 (see our Events Calendar for times).

Each sale nets thousands of dollars of funds for library purchases and improvements; the last go-round resulting in the new digital display and furniture in the Lynn Valley Library lobby lounge.

New books are put out each day, and on Sunday everything is half-price – or you can fill a bag for $3! Please remember to bring your own bag(s!)

Books not sold at the library events are donated to a non-profit organization called Reading Tree, which provides books to disadvantaged families, schools, and libraries.

“Joining the Friends of the Library is a great way to support North Vancouver District Public Library and to volunteer in the community,” said Meghan. Amongst their other duties, Friends members:

  • advocate for library services and fundraise for library projects and resources.
  • organize book-sales and other fundraisers.
  • help at library events such as author talks and District Library Art Receptions.

Membership is $5 annually. Visit here to learn more about joining the Friends or pick up a Friends of the Library brochure at your local branch.

LV man promoting mountain film fest

Lynn Valley resident Steven Threndyle is PR director for the Vancouver International Mountain Film Festival. He’d like to invite the community to come out to the festival, which runs from Feb. 8 to 17.

Steven, tell us about your role in the festival.
I’m the PR director and social media manager (Facebook, Twitter).

And now tell us about your life here in Lynn Valley!
Our family moved to North Vancouver to be close to the mountains. It really does make a world of difference compared to living across town in the city. (I don’t consider any parts of North Van to really be a ‘city’; even if the CNV might beg to differ!) It is really quite something to look up from just about any neighbourhood and see Grouse, Lynn Peak, and Seymour right up close. And the parks and trail system is really something else.

Are you a climber? What drew you to working with the festival?
Haha, no, I’m sort of afraid of heights or ‘exposure’ as climbers call it. Climbing is not a sport to be dabbled in lightly. I’m just really interested in aspects I believe that anyone can enjoy; the quality of light in late afternoon, the visual panorama from standing atop a peak, just… being out in nature, really. I think the festival balances the ‘action porn’ aspect and maybe the more documentary subject matter very well.

Is this your day job, or do you have other professional interests?
Well, right now I’m trying to put a lot of effort into it; but I’m just a very small part of it. I think the Festival has wide ranging appeal and, if anything, is underpublicized – it’s been around for 16 years and it could be more well known. I actually write about real estate to pay the bills – mostly for the Vancouver SUN and Vancouver Observer. And I’ve done some real estate PR as well. Storytelling through social media interests me greatly as well.

What do you think Lynn Valley residents would enjoy about the film fest?
Lynn Valley residents would really enjoy the trail running night since it features several North Shore ultra runners who push the level of endurance, but who are just everyday people who have regular jobs and that sort of thing.  And they do one heck of a job exploring our back yard, too.

There are also some very good movies that are being screened at both Centennial Theatre and the Rio and Pacific Cinematheque theatres, and it all gets under way next Friday night. We’ve just reorganized our special events pages so that it’s easier to find what you’re interested in. The environment night would be worthwhile, too; Paul Colangelo is a fine photographer and we’ve just added two new movies. It’s topical, too, because it’s about the Great Bear Rainforest.

Any other thoughts you’d like to leave with our readers?
As John Muir said: “Go into the mountains and seek their glad tidings.” Or, as I like to say “Never waste a sunny day.” (Especially on the North Shore!)

Good Neighbour announced at LV Christmas finale

Wow! Lynn Valley, you’ve got what it takes!

Last night’s grand finale of the 12 Days of Christmas in Lynn Valley Village was a labour of love by so many, most particularly the hard-working valley folk in the Lynn Valley Community Association, the Lynn Valley Lions and the fine musicians and actors of Lynn Valley United Church.

The two-hour production featured the young adult and adult community choirs of the church, the church’s Friday Night Live improv team, the singing of valley favourite Bobbi Smith, and a storyline that wove throughout the music to bring the message of Christmas home.

 

One definite highlight of the evening was an unscripted marriage proposal, ring and all, sung on stage with harmonic back-up from the FNL crew! Many congratulations to the happy couple, and thanks for sharing your Big Moment with all of us!

 

That was a tough act to follow, but Bobbi Smith managed it just fine, and after a few songs gave a tribute to Lynn Valley’s community values, giving LynnValleyLife the perfect  opportunity to announce the winner of this year’s Good Neighbour Award.

Lynn Valley United Church parishioners in the crowd went wild when they heard that one of their own had won the honour, which was awarded to the person who won the draw of all our top Good Neighbour nominees.

photo courtesy Linda Mackie

We were delighted to give the Good Neighbour Award 2012 plaque and prize package to Rosemary Postlethwaite, a church elder who has spent a decade collecting bottles and cans to help fund the church’s program that makes sandwiches for the homeless. You can read more about Rosemary here, in the nomination that was submitted by Kelly Jenner (who won a gift certificate to the Black Bear Neighbourhood Pub for having nominated the award winner!)

The Good Neighbour Award, launched this year, gave us a very welcome opportunity to share stories about many of the people here in Lynn Valley who reach out to help others in quiet ways, large ways, public ways and private ways. We know there are a lot more fine folks out there, so we hope you keep our Good Neighbour Award in mind over the year to come, so you’ll have someoneto nominate when we launch the award again in November 2013.

In the meantime, we would like to take this year-end opportunity to thank all those community volunteers, especially those people in the groups mentioned above, for putting so much time and effort into the Christmas Tree Walk, the 12 Days of Christmas entertainment, and the first-ever Christmas tree at the corner of Mountain Highway and Lynn Valley Road.

We know it will be a busy year ahead with Lynn Valley Day and other community celebrations, so please consider becoming an active member of one of these organizations, or looking for different ways to support them. Check out their websites, above, and look here for information about joining the community choir that was featured last night.

Wouldn’t that make a great New Year’s resolution?

Merry Christmas, Lynn Valley!

photo courtesy Linda Mackie

Black Bear Band hosts Winter Concert

The annual Winter Concert put on by our very own Lynn Valley community band takes place on Monday, Dec. 17, at Kay Meek theatre, and it is always a crowd-pleaser (they have good goodies, too!) Admission is by donation. Details here (and if getting out more will be part of your new year’s resolve, why not consider joining? Check them out on their website.

 

 

First annual Good Neighbour Award announced!

LynnValleyLife is delighted to introduce a new, year-end community tradition – the 1st annual Good Neighbour Award!

Has someone been a “good neighbour” to you this year? Did a person here in Lynn Valley go out of their way to help you, your family, or our community?

Maybe they spent an evening out in the woods looking for your lost dog. Maybe they spent the year collecting bottles for a school fundraiser. Whatever they did that warmed your heart, we’d love to hear about it.

We’ll share some of our favourite stories on this website as a tribute to Lynn Valleyites’ year-round spirit of goodwill. And then we’ll put them into a random draw so that one of these kindhearted citizens can win LynnValleyLife’s Good Neighbour Award for 2012.

 

They will win:

  • a gift certificate to Aristos Greek Restaurant
  • a one-month rec centre pass
  • a personalized tour of the RCMP station (including RCMP mug & umbrella!), and…
  • a membership in the LV Community Association!

And, as a thank you to the person who nominated the winner, a $25 gift certificate to the Black Bear Neighbourhood Pub will go to the person (19+) who submitted their story!

We can’t wait to hear about the random – or highly organized! – acts of kindness we know take place in our community on a daily basis.  Please submit a paragraph or two that tell your story (including your name and contact information) via the form below, or by emailing info@LynnValleyLife.com, or by mailing The Editor at LynnValleyLife, 1297 Argyle Rd.,  North Vancouver,  V7K 1H5.

We’ll start to publish some of the stories over the following weeks, and we must receive all entries by Wednesday, Dec. 19. The Good Neighbour 2012 prize (and the Black Bear Pub gift certificate!) will be awarded at the Lynn Valley Village Christmas Tree Walk on Sunday, Dec. 23. We hope to see you there, as the Lynn Valley United Church Community Choir and a special guest from the North Pole will also be in attendance that night!

You can help spread the word to others by forwarding this post (or facebooking, or tweeting!) and by downloading this poster to put up around the community. Thanks for helping us find those good neighbours!

By submitting your story, you are agreeing to its possible publication by LynnValleyLife. Should you wish us to use first names only, please let us know – though we reserve the right to publish the first and last name of the Good Neighbour 2012 grand prize winner and his/her nominator.

 

Remembrance Day observances planned

Each year, more and more Canadians are marking Remembrance Day at ceremonies and other events across the country.

North Vancouver hosts the largest cenotaph gathering in Western Canada, an annual tradition at Victoria Park. People should be in place on Sunday before 10:30 a.m. (allow time to walk a few blocks), and thereafter will follow a traditional service, fly-past, parade, music, the presentation of wreaths of remembrance, and of course a moment of silence. For information on the marching parade before and after the ceremony, visit this North Van RCMP press release.

In Lynn Valley, a small ceremony is held at Pioneer Park at the junction of Lynn Valley Road and Mountain Hwy, especially to accommodate seniors and veterans for whom the crowds at Victoria Park are prohibiting. Those who wish to attend are asked to be at the cairn by 10:15 a.m., and to ensure the chairs available go to those who need them the most. Legion president Diana Saboe also notes that everyone is invited to the Lynn Valley Legion Open House following the ceremony; please leave the jeans at home and arrive in proper dress.

Many people also enjoy attending the Remembrance Day assembly at Argyle Secondary, which features thoughtful presentations and musical performances put on by the students. This year’s assembly will take place in the school gym on Friday, Nov. 9 at 10 a.m.

And Lynn Valley United Church will be foregoing its usual Sunday service on Nov. 11 to offer a special performance by Antony Holland, award-winning actor and playwright. Holland will be presenting One Man in His Time, his play that tells of his experiences in Northern Africa during World War II. There, he worked as a code breaker for the British Armed Services and in his spare time mounted theatrical productions wherever he was able.

Admission is by donation at the door, with contributions of $25 or more eligible for a tax receipt. Contact the church office for more information, or look on the church website.

 

Giants hockey tickets support good cause

Lynn Valley’s Bob Rasmus is known to many of us for his ongoing community work with the Lions Club and for co-organizing the ever bigger-and-better annual Lynn Valley Day events. (Click here for a profile we wrote about Bob this spring!)

Currently Bob is zone chairman for all the North Shore Lions Clubs, so we’re happy to help him promote his causes – especially when it comes to a deal on hockey tickets!

If you order tickets to the Giants’ Jan. 30 game against the Prince Albert Raiders, you will not only save five bucks a ticket, you will be supporting the Lions Society’s Easter Seals House. The Vancouver Easter Seals House, located on Oak Street, provides low-cost accommodation for families who are in town for a child’s medical treatment. The house is professionally staffed, includes play facilities and other child-centred features, and is designed to give parents the support they need in order that they can focus on their children’s wellbeing.

To download a hockey tickets order form, click here. Remember, the tix make great Christmas presents – especially in this lock-out year!

Did you know the Lynn Valley Lions Club helps support about fifty local non-profit organizations through its fundraising? Have a look at their website to see how splendidly your Cook Shack hamburger dollars are put to work in the community!