YVO about to transform Heritage Barn into a party palace
Raising funds for BMP cancer clinic and support for activities and services for youth
Johanne Coiteux and Susan Mason, members of the Yamaska Valley Optimist Club, stood in Iron Hill’s Heritage Barn Friday spelling out the details of their upcoming seventh annual barn dance to be held on August 12 starting at 6 p.m.
It’s becoming an annual ritual notwithstanding the huge amount of planning and preparation to make it happen. Although the first barn dance held at the Masons’ Heritage Barn eight years ago served as a fundraising venue for the Jewish General Hospital in Montreal, all that have followed have become driven to support YVO’S Walk for Women’s Cancers. More specifically, as a member of the Yamaska Valley Optimist Club, Mason keeps generously offering her venue as a place that welcomes all who want to be part of the hospital’s clinic for women’s cancers.
According to Coiteux, who is a steadfast friend of Mason and a force to be reckoned with when it comes to community causes, the event has become a Mason family tradition that she is part of. “I become a Mason over the three-day period of setting up, participating, and then cleaning up afterward”. Joyfully and playfully Coiteux describes the hours of shucking corn for over 200 people each year.
The ladies, bubbling over with enthusiasm, say that it’s a lot of work to get the barn prepared for its transformation. Each year Mason’s children say, “This is the last year!” Then they say, “We can’t not have it, we have to have this party. It’s just so much fun.” Similar to Cinderella, the YVO members are like the fairy godmothers of barns, morphing the working structure that has been in the Mason family for five generations and shelters her 150-plus head of beef cattle into a fairyland of lights and flowers fit for royalty, and making it the perfect venue for what appears to be the closest thing to a homecoming. Corn on the cob, BBQ burgers from Mason’s beef, lots of refreshments, a bonfire, and live music by The Cavemen — it’s a winning formula. The owner of the establishment exuberantly expounds that, “The barn dance is just magic. The event is an amalgamation of so many people pitching in and contributing.”
Mason emphasizes that the barn dance is for families. “That’s what moves me and my kids the most, to see how the little ones and the teenagers are having the best night ever. The kids are having fun, their parents are having fun, everyone is having fun at this event.”
Tickets for the event starting at 6 pm can be purchased ahead of time or at the door.
Adults until August 10 cost $20 each and at the door they are $25. Children under 13 years, $5.
Reservations: 450-243-4224 or 450-2435317.