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Times-Advocate, 1979-05-30, Page 17'Tis the season to be jolly all year round at Christmas Ptace "Dashing through the snow, In a one-hourse open sleigh .. Once you step inside you forget that it’s May, and the next time you look out the window, you expect to see snow. Visions of sugar plums dance in your head. And you're not even at the North Pole. It may look like Santa’s workshop, but it’s Christ­ mas Place in Grand Bend. A sign inside the front door reminds shoppers that Christmas is a mere seven months away. But why Christmas in a summer resort like Grand Bend? Manager Kristie Mclndoe says “We needed a drawing to bring tourists in off the highway — we have no walk-in customers here.” So when she decided to open a gift shop four years ago, Christmas became the gim­ mick that made her shop different from the rest. Kristie says they started small, with only one room for Christmas things. Now, they’ve expanded their floor space, and carried the Christmas theme throughout the shop. Christmas Place appeals to one’s spirit of Christmas both by sight and sound. Decorations, ornaments and even mistletoe surround the visitors, and Christmas carols are played over the speaker system. A Christmas tree dominates the front room of Christmas Place. Around it are baskets filled with the 144 different tree ornaments that are for sale. Kristie says that “anything goes” as far as tree decorations are concerned. Little wooden spinning wheels are popular tree ornaments along with, the more traditional elves and angels. The Christmas tree itself is popular with visitors.. Kristie calls it a snowing Christmas tree, that “sort of recycles itself.” The tree works like a fountain, with artificial snow spouting out the top and drifting down over the branches. The “snow” that makes it to the bottom falls into a bin and is pumped back up to the top. The next room features bathroom items with a Christmas theme. One of Kristie’s novelty items is a roll of bathroom tissue that displays the message Merry Christmas in red ink. The toilet paper greeting has been a popular gag gift, Kristie says. They also sell hand made toilet seat covers. A shy Santa peeks out from behind red mittens that partially cover his eyes when the lid is lifted. The seat covers are made at Christmas Place by Kristie and her staff. Another popular gift they make themselves are Christmas door knob covers. Old magazines are fashioned into plump bodies for Mr. and Mrs. Claus. The staff and both of Kristie’s grandmothers work together to paint the magazines red and use cot­ ton batten for the Claus’ hair and beards. Royal Doultan China featuring a Christmas pattern of holly leaves is popular at Christmas Place. Items for the kitchen can be found at the back of Christmas Place. Kristie says that they try to sell un­ usual things that can’t be found in a department store. Hard to come-by items such as tea cosys or full length aprons are featured in the kitchen section. Kristie’s favorite room is the one she has set up for kids. Toys, games and stuff­ ed animals can be found in this section. The stuffed animals range in price from $3.50 to $100.00. The most ex­ pensive fellow is a big brown bear that Kristie calls “Big Bear Foot’’. She says she’d like to keep him for herself, but he sits on the shelf for sale like the rest of the stuff- . ed menagerie. A unique item found in the kids’ section is the tooth fairy angel. Little quilted angels complete with a pocket on the front of their robes can be purchased. The child can put his tooth in the pocket, and hang the angel beside his bed. In the mor­ ning the tooth fairy has replaced the tooth with a shiny coin; Kristie says that grand­ mothers are the main purchasers of the tooth fairy angels. “We appeal to Gran­ nies,” she says with a laugh. Children love to shop at Christmas Place even more than their parents, Kristie says. Once a little girl cried when her parents went to leave because they wouldn’t let her go upstairs to look for Santa Claus. Christmas Place does have a Santa Claus to listen to the gift lists in December. The role of Santa is played by Kristie’s husband, David. He also helps around the shop in his spare time and on weekends putting up shelves or changing displays. Besides volunteer help for craft making from her farrii- ly, Kristie has two employees —• Pauline Regan, Mt. Carmel and Jartet Brazier of London. Pauline says she keeps very busy waiting on customers, working on crafts, and preparing Royal treatment seminar coming WHERE'S SANTA? — Jessica Blackler, 3, of Kirkton, looks in awe at the more than 144 different kinds‘of Christmas tree decorations on sale at Christmas Place. T-A photo ® 1 'TIS THE SEASON? — Christmas Place manager Kristie Mclndoe rearranges the unusual or­ naments on her "snowing" Christmas tree. The Ontario Ministry of Industry and Tourism’s highly successful “We Treat You Royally” campaign initiated last year has resulted in the expansion of hospitality training programs throughout the province. One such seminar will be conducted by Mr. Chris • George at the Village Inn in Grand Bend starting at 9:00 a.m. on Monday, June 4. Mr. George is a consultant with the London office of the Ministry of Tourism and Industry. . Available to hotel, motel, restaurant, shop and service station owners and em­ ployees, the new one-day training sessions aim towards refining Ontario’s hospitality techniques. “The ‘We Treat You Royally’ program was in­ strumental in creating widespread awareness of tourism’s importance to the people and economy of this province," Minister Tourism ] “These sessions directly hospitality industry provide better, friendlier serviceto Ontario’s tourists,” he added. Highlighting the full-day sessions are discussions of tourism’s ecofidffiic impact to Ontario, audio-visual displays of the province’s attractions and hospitality attitudes, instruction on good telephone manners and personal grooming, the establishment Of personal hospitality plans and the completion of a short quiz. Delegates receive a comprehensive kit of tourism materials for future reference following’ the seminar. Successful participants also receive a letter and certificate following com­ pletion of the program along with a “Let’s Treat Visitors Royally” pin. Corrected quiz papers, original personal hospitality plans, suggestions for further improvement of hospitality skills and a course evaluation form are also sent to participants. macrame rope. “And there’s always dusting,” she says. Christmas Place has one room devoted to macrame supplies and in winter Kristie teaches classes in macrame. She s&ys she has had requests to hold the classes in summer, but she doesn’t think she’d have time. Many of the plant hangers or towel holders for sale are her creations. Kristie believes that her shop is the only Chrjstmas store in this area. Since she opened it up, she has visited others in Frankenmuth, Michigan, and in Nova Scotia and Florida. She says that the most popular Christmas stores are those that keep the small shop at­ mosphere. Her shop is in a renovated home. Kristie says it is the oldest house left in Grand Bend, built in 1836. A photograph of the house taken around 1900 is hanging near the door. The Mclndoes are the first to have the house who aren’t part of the family who built it. Kristie says Christmas Place does a year round Easter to the first of so that Santa’s elves ' ’ ' * ’ ’eplenish have thebusiness. They’re open January. Then from January time to r seven days a week from to April they close the shop shelves. ALWAYS SOMETHING TO DO — Employee Pauline Regan uses a candle to burn the ends of ropes which will be used to make macrame hangers at Christmas Place. T-A photo ,” said Ontario of Industry anc| Larry Grossman. new training will help those involved in the to Price Per Copy 25 Cents D D NEW FILM STARS — Pupils, parents and tqachers at Grand Bend Public School starred in a film on rhythmics which will be shown to the Lambton County Board of Education. T-A pholo Area soccer action Colonials, pee wees win The Grand Bend Seniors Soccer team, better known as the “Colonials”, won seven to one over Exeter at their home game Sunday. Tony Mennen and William VandenBygaart each scored a pair of goals for the seniors. Singles were scored by Dave Nolan, Kevin Sim­ monds and Jean ivxeiuicu. Mary’s T-A photo DON'T FEED THE ANIMALS, THEY'RE STUFFED — Jessica pets a friendly Christmas polar bear. T'A Photo By MARY BLEWETT Have you been wondering about the bright pink, yellow and blue flags along the roadside in front of Pinery Provincial Park? Well, after a dozen people asked me - what was going on, I thought I’d better try to find out. New student employees at the Pinery couldn’t help me, and finally my question was directed at naturalist Terry Crabe. I learned that it real­ ly didn’t have anything to do with the Pinery at all — it wasn’t another in their series of erosion control studies. Terry’s answer was sim­ ple — “It’s those pepple from Alberta looking for oil”. Now that brings a lot of questions to mind — why do people from Alberta come here to look for our oil? Don’t they have plenty of oil out there? Terry told me the oil hunters were staying at the Bluewater Motel, and I call­ ed them there. Sure enough, they are hun­ ting for oil — just in time, too, with all the gas shor­ tages in the States. I wonder how long before they’ll be drilling big wells right there along the Bluewater Highway? I was told that it won’t be for a while yet. Spokesman for the group, Gary Dempsey, explained carefully that they were not drilling for oil, their work was “just exploration”. The name of the group is Beaver Geophysical and right now they are working on behalf of Shell Oil. They spend all their time looking for oil for the major oil com­ panies. Those little colored flags indicate where holes will be made so that charges of dynamite can be put down there. The charges will be set off at the same time, and a recording crew will pick up the sound waves made by the underground blasts. The sound will go down and bounce off the bed rock. By the sound of the bounce, they’ll be able to determine whether or not those sand dunes at the Pinery were built over oil. Dempsey calls it a seismic survey. The sound waves are fed into a truck loaded with electronic equipment and the results come out on a piece of paper. The work being done near the Pinery entrance is on highway property. Dempsey says that most of the time they work across coun­ tryside and have to get per­ mission from farmers to hunt for oil on their fields. The farmers are paid for the use of the land, and for any damages. The same oil hunters are working near the communi­ ty of Adelaide. By the end of summer they expect to have taken the search north of Goderich. Maybe they’ll find salty oil there. This was the Colonials fourth win in four games. The next game will be played Sunday at 6:00 p.m. against Naim. The Grand Bend peewees opened their 1979 soccer season with a 4-2 exhibition game victory against the Sarnia City peewees at Sarnia’s Alexander-Mc ­ Kenzie HighsSchool Sunday. $ Outside-left Joey Mommer- steeg was in superb form, scoring three well taken goals for Grand Bend. Inside-forward Robbie Mennen was also in fine form and was the other scorer. Outstanding on seasider’s defence ’keeper Scott Lovie and full­ backs John Van Esbroeck and Chris VanGerwen. Captain of the Grand Bend team for this season is Joey Mommersteeg, and the team will be coached by Dave Silcock and Rick Helm. The local peewees will take on their Sarnia Township counterparts in further exhibition soccer next Saturday. The Bantams game Satur-' day was rained out. Regular play for the Mosquitos, Atoms, Squirts and Girls teams will soon be underway. President of the Bend the were Area children enjoy circus Cloudy skies did not prevent the children of Grand Bend from having a good time at the Circus Sunday. Lions Club president Frank Allister said the circus played before a full house. Allister said the Lions club made over $700 in the ad­ vance ticket sales. The circus was held on the public school grounds and Lions members cleaned up after the show. Traditional circus actB — clowns, trapeze artists, jugglers, elephants, horses and dogs provided the en­ tertainment. Grand Bend Soccer Associa­ tion this year is Tom Vlem- mix. School children become 'stars' About 50 pupils at Grand Bend Public School became film stars for a few minutes Friday afternoon. Because of the success of a project which the Grand Bend school pioneered, a technician from the Lamb­ ton County Board of Education came to the school to make video tapes of the children in action. The Grand Bend pupils were the first in the county to have a program in rhythmic exercise. The rhythmics, or exer­ cises set to music were developed by the late Lloyd Percival. Principal Howard Hartle says the kit con­ taining a record of con­ temporary music and all the necessary data can purchased for $8.50. Hartle says be students took part in the experimental program from January to March. Their pulse and fitness were tested before and after the series of exercises, and significant improvements were shown. The school board was im­ pressed by the statistics and now plan to use the program in other schools. Other school teachers will be able to see the program in action by viewing the video tape made in Grand Bend Friday. Teachers Carole Arm­ bruster and Trish Murdock took partin the filming along with Mr. Hartle and the pupils. Also joining in were interested parents who had taken part in the winter program — Janet Kobe and Gina Fischer, Mrs. Fischer runs a rhythmics class at the school on Tuesday evenirigs for adults.the HUNGRY LLAMA — Cathy Brenner and Darragh Mehagan feed a hungry llama handfuls of grass as circus workers get ready for the show Sunday. T-A photo NOT YOUR AVERAGE PET - Sherri-lynn Twynstra of RR 3 Parkhill stands in awe of the big elephant at the circus in Grand Bend Sunday. T-A photo