Ashton Christmas Village returns for third year
ASHTON, Idaho (KIFI) - For the past three years, visitors to the Museum of The Henry's Fork in Ashton have been able to make Christmas memories once they enter the basement of the museum. There they will find a Christmas village with miniature buildings painted and built to remind the viewer or Christmases past in Ashton.
This year, visitors will be able to see two new additions to the village thanks too many different collaborative efforts. The artist of the murals and many of the different pieces in the village is Joyce Leonard. She says the newest addition of the old ski run that used to be found in Bear Gulch was challenging but fun to build.
"We totally redid this whole wall and we put on Facebook that we were looking for big pieces of Styrofoam or Styrofoam coolers. And what we did with those is we cut them into chunks and then we glued them together and stacked them. And so you had the the Styrofoam pieces behind it and then the snow blanket and then finally the fun parts. The skiers in the building. What's really neat is this Bear Gulch building. People that are raised in Ashton or from this area know the Bear Gulch Lodge," Leonard said.
She adds the village has also grown in other ways.
"One of our other new ones that we've got is back down here. And this is our farm section and it's even got a little spud cellar and a miniature pivot that Mary picked up. Little spud truck, little tractor guys, the farm section, that's our other new section down there. We've got other new pieces we've added behind you is is the section where we got a lot of historical buildings and we've added more to that."
She says they hope that visitors to the display will understand what it was like during the holiday season in Ashton and may invoke memories for many who grew up in the area.
"Everybody that comes in, especially if they're from here, we'll get into it because a lot of our buildings have been remade to look like the old Ashton. And you would think that, oh, little kids would love this and little kids like it, but the adults will come in and pay attention and they're the ones that really get into it and say, Oh, I remember this and I remember that."
As a part of the village display, there will be a silent auction on four redecorated trees. All the proceeds from the auction will help benefit local charities.
Each tree has a theme, to help support the organization the proceeds will go too.
"The turquoise and white tree is for Make-A-Wish Foundation, and I will send those proceeds to Make-A-Wish," Becky Harrigfeld said.
She says the other trees will benefit Primary Care Children's hospital in Salt Lake, Museum of The Henry's Fork and Fremont veterinarian clinic's spray and neutered program.
She says the auction has just grown every year they've done it.
"Last year, we had the two trees. We we raised 1300 dollars. And it was basically for our local flea market and the electricity for the new sorting shed that we had put in next to that flea market."
The Museum is located at 521 Main Street in Ashton. It's open Monday through Wednesday from 10 a.m. to 2p.m. and on weekends from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
After Dec. 3, the hours will be 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Thursday through Saturday.
