Lexi Saldaña
Daily Herald
Kinsmen Park hosted its 31st annual ‘Kidzfest’ Thursday with families and children enjoying the many free amenities including entertainment, crafts, and food.
Taylor Remus (left) and Alice Moase (right) pictured together at the Prince Albert Outreach Program booth — Lexi Saldaña/Daily Herald
Taylor Remus from the Prince Albert Outreach Program said the event being free is an important core to Kidzfest.
“I think with it being free, it brings a lot more people out to the community because that’s one of the things that people struggle with is finances,” she said. “You don’t have to fear that you can’t go to fun community events because you might not have the financial stability to be able to do that.”
The outreach program booth gave free bannock, various kinds of juice, iced coffee and water, and crafts for children to enjoy.
“The smiles and the excitement from the parents about the bannock has been great,” said Remus. Alice Moase, also from the PA Outreach Program added that “[she] loves seeing kids, having fun, and meeting nice little children.”
Remus hopes that more vendors support the event for the following years.
“You could really do anything here as long as as a business you’re okay with it being free,” she said. “But I think this could be something like what the street fair is like, and we saw from last year to this year’s street fair how much bigger that grew so I think something with a lot more vendors would just be great.”
Kidzfest has been made possible by sponsors like the Northern Lights Community Development Corporation and partnership with the city’s Playground Program.
The Playground Program is a summer initiative for children aged 6 to 12, running until Aug. 14. With six locations at various parks throughout the city, it offers a space for supervised sports, crafts, and cultural activities.
Kidzfest featured various activities, including three bouncy castles north of the playground — Lexi Saldaña/Daily Herald
Brooke Anderson, a play leader for the City of PA’s playground program and worker for Kidzfest, said it’s nice to see familiar faces.
“This year we have lots of returning staff, so everybody’s just more experienced and we’re all ready,” she said. “Especially when you know kids from a playground that you’ve been at. My playground has so many returning kids. I just feel like I’m just spending another summer with them.”
Anderson said families enjoy the program.
“I think it’s very beneficial, especially to families who are working in the summer and can’t really afford childcare or can’t really hang out with their kid all day,” she said.
In terms of challenges, she stated that organization was the biggest obstacle with so many staff members, but “[they’ve] been doing this for 31 years, and you just practice every year, and it just gets better and better.”
The park crawled with attendees, with children enjoying various fun activities including face painting, bouncy castles, balloon animals, a live magic show, and even a water park.
“Everything that a kid loves—for free,” said Anderson. “It’s just a great way to bring Prince Albert together.”
