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WHCA Casino Fundraiser is THIS WEEKEND!

Howdy community members! Looking to give some of your time to help out the community? Maybe you made a New Years resolution to volunteer more? Or maybe you just want to be a part of a fun & exciting evening at a casino while getting in on a free meal! Well if any of those apply to you, consider volunteering for our Casino Fundraiser at Cowboy’s Casino!

We are just a few volunteers short of a full roster and ensuring this event’s success. We have received an extremely gracious outpouring of support this week, so lets continue the trend into the weekend.

If you’ve never done a casino night in the past, worry not. The WHCA and Cowboys highly value and appreciate our volunteers to the utmost degree, and we will guide you along the way. Staff is extremely helpful and will be more than happy to help out and answer any and all questions you may have.

If you’d like to give a little of your time on Sunday and Monday, May 5th & 6th, you can volunteer with us by calling 403.283.0464 ext 6, emailing admin@westhillhurst.com, or fill out the online form on our volunteer page.

*UPDATED OPENINGS*
SUNDAY, MAY 5
6:30pm to 3am
Cashier
11pm to 3am
Supervisor
Staff

MONDAY, MAY 6
6:30pm to 3am
Cashier
Banker

Sponsorship & Advertising in the WHCA

We have some new and unique opportunities for local area businesses who are looking to connect with the West Hillhurst community!

Throughout 2019, not only will we be replacing the ice in the arena, but we are also adding a new gym wall divider! This means there will be brand-new sponsorship opportunities in these areas.

For the ice arena, we are adding 4 logos from sponsors onto the ice. These logos will be approximately 12’x7.5′ and will be painted around the center of the arena. Once the new ice is placed, these logos will be in place for 3 years and will be seen by all of our arena attendees, hockey & skating participants, and patrons of the Barn Pub! For only $1000/year, this is a great opportunity to connect with community members and your new customers.

In the gym, we will be replacing the current divider with a brand-new retractable wall! Sponsors for this wall will receive a large 6’x10′ logo on one of 4 spots along the divider as well as recognition on a wall-sign for when the divider is not in use. Our gym is extremely well attended and in use year-round. You can be a part of this opportunity for just $1200/year and expand your audience across Calgary’s inner-city neighbourhoods.

To learn more about these sponsorship opportunities and more, contact our marketing & communications coordinator Kyle at marketing@westhillhurst.com. We also have a marketing package pdf which can be viewed from www.westhillhurst.com/advertising-sponsorship/

Ready, Set, Grow!

If you’ve become a part of the 2019 community gardens at the WHCA, or if you’re an aspiring/practiced gardener looking to get more experience for your green thumb, then stop by and check out our gardens opening on April 27th and take in the great garden talk by Calgary’s Cottage Gardener Janet Melrose!

To coincide with Spruce It Up!, our community clean-up day, we are also have a clean-up and preparation of the community garden plots. Volunteers from Youth Central will be present to help get your plot in tip-top shape so you can use your new-found knowledge from Janet’s garden talk while it’s still fresh in your mind.

Janet’s talk begins at 10 am and has a $10 admission for the general public but can be attended for free if you own a 2019 Community Garden plot with the WHCA. Topics to be covered include:

  • Using your space wisely
  • planting techniques
  • companion planting
  • crop rotation
  • and more!

For more information about the gardens or Spruce It Up!, check out their respective posts on our blog, or visit the gardens page or the events page.

Get a Helping Hand With Your Spring Projects

The Job from the Jar Day contest is coming to an end at the end of April, so you have a little over two-weeks to get your entry in if you haven’t already!

March & April’s JobJar contest in West Hillhurst will  see a lucky community resident and a neighbour of their choice win a free day with a handyman to help them out with their spring projects! Whether you need a hand cleaning up your yard, moving some things around the house, completing some home renovation projects, or whatever you can think of, the JobJar Skilled Doers will be able to spend some time helping you get those projects done. So if you’ve got any sort of project on the go, and would like to help out a neighbour in the process, then throw your name in the hat and see if you win.

For the West Hillhurst contest, we were lucky enough to get West Hillhurst Paint & Design on board to donate a gallon of paint for you and a neighbour of your choice! How’s that for an extra cherry on top?

To enter West Hillhurst’c Job from the Jar Day contest, visit www.jobjar.ca/jjp/?westhillhurst and fill out the entry form. We will announce the winner at the conclusion of the contest at the end of April.

Good luck!

Spruce It Up 2019

Need a hand putting a dent in your spring cleaning? Have you got some stuff laying around just waiting to get thrown out or recycled? Join us on Saturday, April 27th for Spruce It Up!: Our annual community clean-up day!

This year for Spruce, we’ll be joined by some great local businesses to aid in waste and recyclable collection and disposal. The list so far includes:
City of Calgary – regular garbage & organic yard waste (items too big for black/green bin usage)
Comrie Sports – sports equipment in good condition for donation
Vecova – bottles & cans
GEEP – electronics
Best Shred – paper/document shredding
Cerebral Palsy Foundation –  clothing and household item donation
Navajo Metals – scrap metal
West Hillhurst Paint & Design – paint collection
With more to come!

With these great helpers present, we’ll be able to deal with almost anything you bring our way. If you’ve got recommendations for us to include in future Spruce events, let us know!

For this year’s event, we will have areas designated through the arena parking lot for you to drop off your stuff. Once you’ve been able to visit the appropriate station, stop by the BBQ on your way out and help yourself to a burger, brat, and a beverage!

So stop by on the 27th and let us help you clean-up the community!

Website Changes Under Way

Throughout the coming weeks, we’ll be making some minor tweaks and changes to the design, layout, and content on the WHCA website. You may have even noticed some of them already, such as changes to the navigation bar, additional pages, and updated content. While we try to keep the website as up to date as possible, we realized not all aspects are totally intuitive or optimized for your convenience. We want your experience on the WHCA website to be as seamless and painless as possible and we hope the ongoing changes will help with that.

For starters, we have now arranged our programs menu into Youth & External programs. Please feel free to check out the new Youth Programs landing page and provide us with any feedback you may have.

We have also added a “News & Events” option on our menu where we have made additions such as access to our monthly e-newsletters, full digital copies of the West Hillhurst Warbler, and a link to subscribe to our newsletter.

You can now subscribe to receive updates about ice & gym time availability under the “Scheduling” menu, as well as get a membership, volunteer, and more under the “Get Involved” option.

There are a number of other small changes we’ve made and more to come, so take some time to explore the website in the coming weeks and let us know what features and changes you’d be interested in seeing.

2019 Gardens Update

The 2019 gardening season is upon us at West Hillhurst Community Association! The garden plots along the front of the facility are now available to community members. We opened plot sales up to previous members around mid-March to allow participants to snag their past-plots and maintain their same gardens they had in prior seasons, but we still have many beds available! By purchasing a 2019 garden plot, you will have 24/7 access to your planter and will be able to grow whatever your heart desires (as long as it’s suitable for the weather conditions)! Plots are available for only $40 and are 5.5′ in diameter.

The front of West Hillhurst Community Association has a beautiful patio consisting of garden beds, benches, a library, and a picnic table for community use. Let’s work together, grow together, learn together! We celebrate individuality and inclusiveness with gardeners of all ages. If you love to grow vegetables but don’t know how or have no space, we can help! We also have a full schedule of gardening seminars to help all levels of gardeners.

All participants must sign up for a volunteer position with the gardens in addition to properly maintaining their own plot all season.

To learn more or to get your plot for 2019, visit westhillhurst.com/gardens, call us at 403.283.0464 ext. 6, or stop by the office.

Green Shirt Day at the WHCA

Join the WHCA in support of Green Shirt Day 2019! On Sunday, April 7th, we will be having a free community event from 3 to 5 pm in conjunction with Green Shirt Day in order to raise awareness for organ & tissue donation in honour of the “Logan Boulet Effect.”

“On April 7, 2018, Humboldt Broncos defenceman, Logan Boulet succumbed to his injuries, his parents, Bernadine and Toby Boulet offered to donate his organs so that six lives could live on. They did so, because Logan told his parents, he was registering as an organ donor, and that he was inspired by his coach and mentor Ric Suggitt. Ric passed on June 27th, 2017 and was also an organ donor and saved 6 lives.

As news spread of the organ donation, by this young hockey player, over 100,000 people registered to become organ donors in the days and weeks that followed. To date this is the largest number of Canadians registering to become organ donors in Canadian History due to one event – one person.

Green Shirt Day, hopes to honour, remember, and recognize all the victims and families of that fatal crash, and to continue Logan’s legacy, by inspiring Canadians to talk to their families and register as organ donors.

In Canada, almost 90% of Canadians say they support organ donation, but only 23% have actually registered their intent to donate. Though donation rates have improved over the last ten years, there is more to be done as approximately 250 Canadians die annually waiting for an organ transplant.”
-GreenShirtDay Website

The WHCA’s Green Shirt Day event will feature free food and beverages supplied by our friends at the Barn Pub and Sunterra Market. Calgary Flames alumni Jamie Hislop will be in attendance and available for photos & autographs. We will wrap up the event with a free public skate in the WHCA Arena from 4 to 5 pm.

So rock a green shirt and come on by on April 7th and show your support for this great cause!

Ten Thousand Villages – Artisan Stories

This week, the WHCA would like to share with you a story given to us from our Member Benefits Partner, Ten Thousand Villages. It’s about an artisan in Burkina Faso, and was fantastically written by Rachel Boss, who is currently living in Burkina Faso, working with Mennonite Central Committee’s Serving and Learning Together (SALT) program and Ten Thousand Villages. “I work as an Artisan Advisor, which means that I learn from Burkinabé artisans, gaining a deeper understanding of their artistic practices, do art of my own, and serve as a connecting link between Ten Thousand Villages and the artisans who are behind the products from Burkina Faso which Villages sells. It’s the most amazing work — artisans are immensely creative people, and I’m inspired each day by the way they create!” Rachel says.

Maker Story: Issouf from Burkina Faso

“I learned how to do bronze with my father. When I was a young boy, he would hold me in his arms while he worked on his craft. It was an apprenticeship that existed between father and son.”

Issouf is an artisan working in Burkina Faso.

Issouf sits on a ragged wooden stool against a cement wall. He’s concentrated, sweat dripping onto his hands as he gently shapes the bee’s wax model. He takes great care to get the proportions right. The mother’s hands are perfectly positioned under the book she holds with a child poised on her lap. Issouf decides the child’s head looks a little small. He adds more wax. “Et viola”, he says with quiet satisfaction as he holds it up to show me.

Issouf and his team of around twelve artisans work to create lost wax bronze pieces for Ten Thousand Villages. “Everyone is happy here. We don’t get in fights, we have discussions. I seek to understand each person I work with, to really know them. We’re like a family.”

Lost wax bronze making is an intense process, and is one of the oldest known forms of bronze casting in the world, dating back to the 3rd millennium BC, having sustained little change since its inception.

Starting with a bee’s wax form, artisans sculpt their models and then cover them with banco, a mixture of donkey dung and mud which has been arduously pounded together with a pestle, the same material used to construct homes in Burkina and other nations around the world.

Adding two layers of banco over the wax, he creates a small hole which reveals only a portion of the wax model. After baking under the midday Sahelian sun for a few hours, Issouf will bake the hardened, now unrecognizable form once again, this time in white hot coals of what seems like an ever-burning fire. He’ll tend the coals, turning the pieces so that the wax leaves the model through the small hole completely.

Surely this iLost Wax Bronze Casting in Burkina Fasos a craft of patience, and endurance. Standing over a fire, in the sun, which at mid-day in Burkina can heat workshops to well over 100*F (39*C) without the addition of white-hot flames is not for the faint of heart (or for those who are prone to fainting in general).

After the wax is melted completely from the model, it’s time to heat the bronze. Various artisans have told me that bronze melts at around 1,200* C, or 2,300* F. Artisans use any recycled bronze they can find — bullet casings, bronze knobs from gas tanks, and old bits and pieces they’ve collected.Recycled bronze used by artisans in Burkina Faso

Carefully pouring the molten bronze into the stone-hard banco model, it’s left to sit for hours, sometimes days, to harden. Once cooled, the earthen model is broken by hammers and small chisels, revealing a rough, many times incomplete, bronze statue.

The abrupt edges of statues are smoothed with large metal files, and that’s when the pieces, borne from donkey dung and bullet casings, truly shine.

As a final touch, artisans add patina, breathing life and dimension into their pieces.

And then the process begins again.

Recycled bronze used by artisans in Burkina Faso

Because banco models must be broken away from the bronze that lies beneath, every lost-wax bronze statue is unique. After creating this piece, Issouf must start the process again from his chunk of beeswax.

A craft shaped by millenia of practice, Ten Thousand Villages has invested in preserving something that is at the heart of Burkinabé artisanal culture. And not only is the historical art form maintained, it’s celebrated when invested in. It’s given value and made accessible in the international market-place. By paying him a fair wage for the work he loves, Issouf takes great pride in his work and the life he lives. “With the work Ten Thousand Villages supplies, I have been able to save money, and eventually built my own house, the one you see here. I am proud of the work I do.”

Join Us for the Kids Easter Party!

The WHCA has the perfect excuse to get you and the kids out of the house over Easter long weekend – the WHCA Kids Easter Party!

On Saturday, April 20th from 1 to 3 pm, we’ll be hosting Easter festivities at the community association for children of all ages. Activities include an Easter egg hunt, kid-friendly crafts, healthy treats, and other fun Easter games. This afternoon is guaranteed to be a lot of fun and engage your kids in the spirit of the Easter season! So come on by the association and take in the great spring weather while partaking in these great Easter activities.

Admission to the Easter Party is only $5 each with a valid WHCA Family Membership, and $10 for non-members. To get a WHCA Family Membership if you don’t already have one, swing by the office and we will be happy to help you with getting one. Family Memberships are only $36.75 a year and can be used by anyone within your household! Along with discounts on events such as these, you also receive exclusive discounts at local businesses.

For more info on the Easter Party, visit westhillhurst.com/whca-events

For more info about Family Memberships & benefits, visit westhillhurst.com/whca-membership

We hope to see you at the party!