5th Annual Earth Day Festival at Forest Park Nature Center
2009 Earth Day Festival at Forest Park Nature Center
This is my second consecutive year of taking and “Earth Day” vacation from work. I purposely scheduled the week to coincide with events like the Earth Day Festival at Forest Park Nature Center. This particular event now holds a bit of sentimental value for me as it was the first real step I took in entering the environmental community. It was at this event last year when I met David and Kiersten who essentially recruited me in helping with their Global Warming Solutions Group of Central Illinois which is a group that was spun off of the local Sierra Club chapter to focus solely on presenting solutions to climate change to Central Illinois.
A year ago, I was a casual visitor to the event. This year, I was a participant at the the booth shared by the Heart of Illinois Sierra Club and the Global
Sierra Club and Global Warming Solutions Group Booth
Warming Solutions Group. I felt like event was a success as we talked with visitors about energy efficiency, the Cool Cities program of the Sierra Club, and even rain barrels. In fact, it was a last minute decision by Kassy to bring the rain barrel that she has purchased but had not installed yet that brought the most attention to the booth. By the end of the day, I felt very comfortable talking about how to install them despite the fact that I have not yet at the opportunity to do so. In retrospect, I wish we were selling the barrels as it could have been a great way to raise funds for the Solutions Group.
Sydney enjoyed the face painting.
We decided recently to build an e-mail list so we can contact local residents with a monthly newsletter or special announcements. In order to motivate people to sign up, we offered a prize drawing for e-mail subscribers that consisted of one of 3 copies of the book Cut Your Energy Bills Now by Bruce Harley and a package of CFL light bulbs. I highly recommend this book for anyone wanting to take a look at the energy usage in their home. It is presented in a very user-friendly style with steps that even I can accomplish with my amateur handyman skills.
All in all, it was a thoroughly enjoyable event. The weather flirted with us throughout the day delivering wind gusts early on, but the cloud cover never resulted in any rain. It wasn’t until the last hour of the event when the clouds cleared up and the sun heated things up.
Live entertainment throughout the event.
The bulk of my time was spent working at the event, but I did escape long enough to visit with some of the other booths including Peoria Wilds, the South Side Mission, Goodwill, and Peoria Families Against Toxic Waste. All of them had great information, and I found myself trying not to dive in to all of their causes and helping them out. I have to carefully pick and choose how many commitments I make. It’s a case of quality over quantity.
Kids decorate an Earth Day 2009 banner.
Bob Lindsay Honda provided some hybrid cars for viewing.
