Victoria Tea Festival
In 1982, Valerie and I moved the cat and dog to Victoria from Saltspring Island. Soon after, Valerie continued her preschool children’s involvement by setting up the Camosun College Day Care. During her time there she worked with Judy Smith.
Not too many Years later, Judy’s husband, Scott, became an educator at the same day care. (He retires this year). There daughters began their education at South Park School where our daughter, Marissa, went.
Too make a long story short, the government has threatened the day care with financial hardship and Luc van Hanuse, a parent involved in the day care (now part of Camosun College Child Care Services), became involved and volunteered to lead a drive to boost the funding by creating and putting on a tea festival.
BTW, Scott threatened me with a visit from Fat Tony a la the Godfather scenario. I laughed too hard to refuse!
With the tremendous efforts of Luc and sponsors (we have been a very small one -look to Silk Road Tea Company for the major role in that area), a hundred volunteers, the 1st Annual Victoria Tea Festival became a reality at the Holiday Inn on Blanshard. Too small a venue, Luc had the festival moved to the Victoria Conference Centre for last week’s edition.
So, on a sunny day, we enjoyed the opportunity to wow and impress hundreds of people with about 10% of our regular goods. Brownies, and other squares, breads chocolate torte and cookies formed the bulk of our presentation.
It was a very classy, fun atmosphere. Presenters were professional, live music was wonderful. Samples were generous and the ambiance was delightful.
