Volunteer Elisa Camargo places figurines in a display -photos 250News

Prince George, B.C. – Tomorrow,  the 22nd Annual Spirit  of the North  Healthcare Foundation’s Festival of Trees  will  get underway  at the Prince George Civic Centre and volunteers are working hard to make sure everything is ready.“We are ahead of schedule in putting it all together” says  Festival Assistant co-ordinator Allison McCray. “We’ve had so  many volunteers this year, it’s been wonderful, so we feel we are on target.”

To mark the City’s centennial, the organizers wanted to have 100 trees  on display.  McCray  says they’ve reached  that goal ” I think  we are  right around 100 plus.  Big trees  and little trees about half and half,  but all decorated.”

The   festival has a “lumberjack” theme this year,   a theme that is evident the moment  you walk into the Civic Centre.  There is a  log cabin display  with  lumberjack “George” sitting  in the  ‘snow’

(photo at right,    Sandra DaSilva, who created ‘George’ spreads out some  cotton batting snow)

Organizing   the festival is a year long event says McCray “We’re already  talking and thinking about next year as we see our space and  we’re already thinking about a theme”.

This is the 22nd  annual  Festival of Trees,  and  making it  fresh each year  is no small feat says McCray  “It’s always a challenge, there’s always something going on, this year, we are  focusing on Prince George’s  100th birthday, next year, there’s an anniversary coming up we’re going to kind of work around.  But everyone always has great ideas, so there’s always something.”

The Festival gets underway Friday  evening with a fashion show  which is a sold out event.  Saturday evening’s  Dance and Dine Among the Pine is also sold out  as are  one of the brunches and the Senior’s lunch.

The doors open to the public Saturday at 9 am.

All proceeds from the Festival of Trees  go to the Spirit of the North Healthcare Foundation. Below is the full schedule of events for the  Festival.