Stevensville Creamery Picnic this weekend

Sean Doyle, president of the Stevensville Civic Club, is the chair of this year’s Creamery Picnic.

Doyle, who moved here with his family in the summer of 2019, said that his introduction to the community was through the Creamery Picnic. “We volunteered for the beer garden through a post on Facebook. Now this has become a family affair for us.” He and his wife Lyndsey enjoyed the experience, and he said they were impressed by the volunteer ethic displayed by people like Joan Prather. They ended up joining the Civic Club board. Lyndsey is in charge of the Kids’ Games this year, and has been getting a lot of help from their two children, Morgan, 13, and Ethan, 11. Doyle said the kids are helping get the prizes ready and other similar tasks.

Doyle and the entire board have been working hard to make sure this year’s picnic will be a major success. It will include all the usual time-honored activities like the kids parade and grand parade, as well as the newer events like the young entrepreneurs vendor fair, and the watermelon eating contest.

“One of the things with having a younger board is, we’ve all got full time jobs and kids, so delegation became a big thing this year,” said Doyle. “Each board member took a piece of the Picnic and then found their own people to help them.” 

This year there will again be a street dance on Main Street in addition to the music at the Lewis & Clark Park stage. This was in response to repeated requests from Main Street businesses to once again have activities on Main Street. On Friday, the band “Shodown” will play on Main Street at 7 p.m. while “Tightline” will be playing in Lewis & Clark Park at the same time. On Saturday, “Joan Zen” will be performing at 7 p.m. at the park.

Other events that happen in the Main Street area on Friday include model trains running in the basement below Valley Drug on Friday evening and Saturday; other First Friday events at downtown businesses, and the Kids Parade at 6 p.m.

On Saturday morning, events in the Main Street area include the annual pancake breakfast at the Masonic Temple on E. 3rd, and the Stevensville Volunteer Fire Department will be running the “Fill the Boot!” campaign for Muscular Dystrophy. The Stevensville Farmers Market will be open all day on W. 3rd and downtown businesses will have special sales, etc. The Grand Parade starts at 11 a.m. After the parade, free horse-drawn wagon rides will be available. The popular Firefighter Games will take place from 2 to 4 p.m. on W. 2nd. 

And those are just the downtown events. A multitude of activities take place at Lewis & Clark Park starting Friday afternoon and then running all day Saturday. There are kids’ games, the beer garden, arts and crafts vendors, food trucks and much more. Greased pig races and the Pot of Gold raffle round out the annual festival. You can find the complete schedule on page 11. 

It costs about $30,000 to put on the Creamery Picnic. The entire event is funded through sponsorships from local businesses, and the money raised through vendor fees and beer sales. The event is the Civic Club’s only major fundraiser, and the proceeds are used to advance the club’s mission, which is to improve the quality of life for residents of the greater Stevensville community. 

In addition to Doyle and his wife Lyndsey, other Civic Club board members are Cheryl Burgmeier, vice president, Darcy Hansen, secretary, and Jaime Devlin, Mariane Maynard, and Eli Madero (alternate). 

“This has been a real learning experience,” said Doyle. “After this one is done, we’re going to assess and see what changes we might make. My wife says, ‘Creamery Picnic is by the community, for the community.’ We’re going to find out what changes the community would like to see.”

With the effort that Doyle and his board are putting into the Creamery Picnic this year, it’s bound to be a huge success.