[00:00:00] Fuzz Martin: Thanks for listening to Fifteen Minutes with Fuzz. I’m your host, Fuzz Martin. For those of you keeping track at home, this is episode 19. Only five episodes so far, not including this one, have actually been 15 minutes long. I confess. Again, fifteen minutes is the suggestion, not the rule, okay? It’s like when I tell my wife I’m leaving the office in 15 minutes and it ends up being 29.
So, you both understand at this point, when I say 15, I mean, hopefully 15. This week I have a feeling we’re going to be right AT 15, but the episode is young, so let’s get to it. We’ll be right back. Our conversation this week is with Lori Yahr. Lori is the executive director at Enchantment in the Park, the beautiful holiday drive thru light display at West Bend’s Regner Park.
Enchantment is a big attraction every year. There’s a lot of work that goes into it, and there are a lot of people who make it happen. And without any more ado, here’s Lori Yar. On Fifteen Minutes with Fuzz.
So one of the most wonderful events of the Christmas season, Enchantment in the Park in West Bend’s Regner Park is underway now through Christmas Eve. Lori, how long have you been preparing for this each year? I always want to know.
[00:01:42] Lori Yahr: Um, well, people are surprised. We start pretty much immediately after Christmas.
Last year, um, we do have a gentleman, his name is Gary. He, uh, works in our workshop. The, the park was very, uh, very nice, very generous. They gave us a workshop down at Regner Park and we store a number of our displays in that workshop and then Gary comes in and, And he thinks of new ideas, runs it by the board, um, we just say, say yes or no depending on budget and need.
Um, every year we drive through and try to look for open spots. Uh, it is getting full though. We are, we are filling up, which, which is a good thing because our warehouse is getting full. So he starts pretty much building right away and get coming up with ideas and buying lights. And then we also, um, About March time, we start retesting every light that we have out in the field.
We test in the workshop to make sure that they, they turn on. And it is amazing how many light strings we have to replace from year to year. Oh,
[00:02:38] Fuzz Martin: I’m, I’m certain. I mean, even just being a homeowner, just knowing what we got to replace on it, like these six strings that we normally have, I can only imagine.
So Gary’s kind of like a tinkerer. Does he, does he decorate his own house too?
[00:02:49] Lori Yahr: He does, from what I can tell. I don’t, I don’t, I don’t go around and look at Christmas lights after this, so I don’t know.
[00:02:57] Fuzz Martin: Do you decorate your own house?
[00:02:58] Lori Yahr: My husband does. Okay,
[00:02:59] Fuzz Martin: okay. I was curious if it was like the cobbler that doesn’t have shoes.
Nope, nope, nope. I don’t
[00:03:05] Lori Yahr: have any interest in. I’m more of a delegator, not the doer, so.
[00:03:10] Fuzz Martin: Sure, sure. So the planning for the next year, I know you guys introduce like a lot of different, uh, cool things set to music and light displays and this year you guys have, is it a, you’ve got a new attraction, right?
[00:03:22] Lori Yahr: We’ve got, we’ve got I think three or four new attractions. We have a, uh, a large theater light type structure, Sing Sing Sing. Uh, we’ve always had trouble kind of designating where our entertainment building is. So these are four feet tall, lit up with theater lights, so that’s a great addition. Uh, Gary built a, um, he wanted a starlit display, and he came up with the design, so it’s hidden in there somewhere, so if you want to go and look for it, it’s teal, which is different, so you got to look for that.
And then our newest, well, then we had Slinger Skills USA, they built us our old, uh, 1900s Um, buildings were really getting old, hard to put up, hard to take down. Um, so they, it’s the high school group, they built us three new buildings that are absolutely beautiful. Awesome. So you want to see that. And then we have a new depot that a general contractor built for us.
That turned out awesome. Very excited about that. But our new, new, new addition is our 60 foot RGB tree. Um, we had our old tree. It was 40 feet tall. You could see it from Park Avenue. You could see it from everywhere. And it was getting old. It was getting hard for our volunteers to put up. We didn’t really trust it.
So we said, yep, let’s design a new one. Then, and of course, you know, you don’t, we don’t go small. We always go big. So we decided on a 60 foot tree that was engineered in Texas.
[00:04:39] Fuzz Martin: Okay.
[00:04:39] Lori Yahr: And we do believe it’s the tallest RGB tree in Wisconsin. So it will be something to see.
[00:04:43] Fuzz Martin: So before you could see it from Park Avenue and now you can see it from Holy Hill.
[00:04:46] Lori Yahr: Probably, probably.
[00:04:48] Fuzz Martin: That’s great. So Enchantment in the Park, you talk about the planning, but the actual setup, how long does that take to. Set up and then even take down at the end of the year.
[00:05:00] Lori Yahr: We start the first weekend in October unloading our trucks. We have um, we have our warehouse but we also have to bring in three trailer truck loads of stuff.
Um, those come off the trailers on that weekend. The next weekend we have our major setup. Um, and we have about 250, 300 people out there on that first Saturday. We do have 35 plus groups that help us set up,
[00:05:22] Fuzz Martin: um,
[00:05:22] Lori Yahr: and take down. So, um, we share in our profits with those groups. So they come in, we give them a little area and there’s a lot of groups that have been with us now for the last three or four years.
So they know what to do. They, they’re like, where’s our stuff? You know, we want to go put it up. Um, so they put it up, they plug it in, they do all that. And then for the next bunch of weeks, we set, we uh, make sure everything’s working, we add the little stuff in between, we um, make sure the music and the sound is all going on, so it’s, it’s a process.
I’m still out there today putting things out, so it’s a process. Sure.
[00:05:53] Fuzz Martin: No, definitely. And so, Over the whole event, you, you have how many volunteers? Um,
[00:05:58] Lori Yahr: we’re up to about 800 volunteers for the setup, takedown, and the operation of the event. West Bend is, not even West Bend, Washington County is just phenomenal with the amount of volunteer power we have.
[00:06:10] Fuzz Martin: Yeah, definitely. I, I, I’ve seen it around here and, uh, the, the resources that we have are great and we’re, we’re blessed to have that in our community. Over the 13 years that Enchantment in the Park has been in operation, You guys have brought in hundreds of thousands of pounds worth of food donations and thousands of dollars in cash donations.
Who is served by those donations? You kind of touched on the volunteers and those volunteer organizations, but can you give some insight on that?
[00:06:35] Lori Yahr: Well, just as an example of the volunteer organizations, it’s anywhere from a thousand to theater group, a Boy Scout group, soccer leagues, baseball, a lot of baseball groups that come and help us out.
You know, they have to sell an awful lot of pizzas to make what we’re giving them. Great. And this gets the kids involved in it. You know, they’re coming out, they’re parents and kids all at one time. And, um, we have this local dance group and they bring a hundred, hundred, between a hundred parents and, and kids all together, so, and then we feed them, so a lot of pizzas that day, which is fun, but yeah, no, it’s, it’s really fun to see, and it’s just, it’s fun giving, you know, we, we take in money, but then we also give it, we give it a great amount of it back to the community.
[00:07:13] Fuzz Martin: Right, and it, it takes, uh, a lot of money, I’m sure, to make this. Go and I see, I mean, you guys have a ton of great sponsors and when you get to Enchantment in the Park, there’s not a fee, but there’s a, uh, suggested donation, right?
[00:07:27] Lori Yahr: Yeah, a suggested donation of 10 or a big bag of food or even the best thing is a big bag of food and a 10 donation.
Sure. Then it’s serving the food, food pantries, and it’s also serving our organization, which we. Give a lot back out to the community. Yeah,
[00:07:42] Fuzz Martin: certainly. And which food pantries, a number of food pantries in the area? Um,
[00:07:45] Lori Yahr: uh, you know, the, the, uh, Full Shelf Food Pantry in West Bend is the governor of those food pantries.
And I believe Jackson’s involved now and Kewaskum is involved now. Um, and they have volunteers that come out nightly and administration. And uh, one thing about Chapman
[00:08:03] Fuzz Martin: Park,
[00:08:04] Lori Yahr: which is so small as you might there, the majority of people So,
[00:08:13] Fuzz Martin: you don’t get the look for an après mid dinner over
[00:08:20] Lori Yahr: the It’s entirely
[00:08:22] Fuzz Martin: restaurant designed of foods donated typically aren’t.
Uh, usable by the food pantry, so make sure if you go to enchantmentpark. org, look at the food pantry needs list and before you come and before you shop, uh, take a look at that and also again, look at the expiration dates and we want to make sure that the people who are benefiting from this are getting the food that they can actually use and that the food pantries don’t have to discard stuff.
How long has this been going on now?
[00:08:50] Lori Yahr: Uh, we started in 2009. Um, the first couple of years we were at the Fair Park. Um, we moved it to Regner and it’s really found its home there. So, um, which is great because we know where everything gets plugged in and the park has been phenomenal with allowing us the space and It’s a, it’s a win win for everybody.
It brings it down to a really cool park. Um, it’s warmer there because it’s insulated a little bit with the trees. We have the horse and carriage and they’re able to go around the pond. So it’s, it’s a beautiful location for enchantment in the park.
[00:09:19] Fuzz Martin: Yep, and very easy to get on, uh, into the park. Enter on, it’s on, uh, Silverbrook, right?
[00:09:24] Lori Yahr: For the drive thru, enter on Silverbrook, yes. And we do recommend, uh, people ask all the time, should they drive through this? Should they walk? If you’re going to walk, you’re not going to see the whole show. You’re only going to see about 25 percent of it, so we suggest driving through, parking your car, and then walking back in to get a cup of hot chocolate, a treat, um, we do have marshmallows going, um, over fire pits on the weekends, on Friday and Saturday, we have horse and carriage rides, for a minimal amount of money on Friday and Saturday nights.
We
[00:09:53] Fuzz Martin: Those are pretty popular, right? So if you want to get that, you want to show up early, right? Right,
[00:09:57] Lori Yahr: show up earlier, just expect to dress warm, expect to stand outside and wait for it. And we do have live entertainment most nights. So it’s going to be your local, We’ve got some hired performers, we’ve got, you know, all different type of performances every night, so that’s fun to see.
[00:10:12] Fuzz Martin: What about old Mr. Claus? Is he going to be head enchantment of the park this year?
[00:10:16] Lori Yahr: He is, he is. And not every night this year, um, he’ll be there December 2nd through the 5th. Ninth through the 12th and then after the 16th, all the way till the 23rd. Of course, he is not there on the 24th and we all know the reason why
Um, so he’s there from five until nine. He is busy on the 24th and then also mention on the 24th we don’t have the, um, horse and carriage that night or the inside buildings aren’t open. Then it is drive, just drive through for the 24th. Sure. But it is open.
[00:10:44] Fuzz Martin: Sure. Uh, great. And then the Enchantment of the Park starts the Friday, uh, Black Friday, goes through Christmas Eve, right?
And it’s open every single day?
[00:10:53] Lori Yahr: That’s correct. Yes.
[00:10:54] Fuzz Martin: And what time is that open? Is it very day by day or?
[00:10:56] Lori Yahr: Nope. Five o’clock until nine o’clock every night.
[00:10:58] Fuzz Martin: Okay. Very good. And then how many people typically come through Enchantment of the Park?
[00:11:02] Lori Yahr: We get between 000 people a year. So it’s a lot of people and it’s great.
Yeah. So if the weather keeps up like it is this year, we’re going to have a record crowd again. Right.
[00:11:12] Fuzz Martin: No, that’s great. If somebody wants to become a volunteer, what is the best way for them to get involved?
[00:11:18] Lori Yahr: You can just go onto the website, EPIC put together the website, and there is an area there where you’ve got all the directors names and emails.
Email any one of those people and they’ll make sure that you get a chance to volunteer. Or, if you want to volunteer this year, you want to bring your family in, or you just want something to do that’s a little bit different and giving back to the community yourself, you can just show up. at the Kiwanis building at five o’clock, and we’ll put you with a group that’s already established, and you can work all night long that night.
[00:11:44] Fuzz Martin: Sure, and if high school kids want to get their volunteer hours, is that something they can do?
[00:11:48] Lori Yahr: 100 percent, 100 percent. We have a lot of high school kids at work, and there’ll be somebody there to sign your slip at the end of the night, so. Awesome,
[00:11:54] Fuzz Martin: okay. I’ve got a 17 year old who’s looking for volunteer hours, and I know Send them down, or her down.
Send her your way. Yep. The website is enchantmentpark. org, again, enter off Silverbrook Drive, either from 33 or from North Main Street side, and if you’re walking, there’s a separate parking lot just north of Silverbrook on, on North Main Street there, and just enter from there. Correct. And we are planning on going next weekend, so should be good, and Lori, I, I, this is an event that we look forward to every year.
Our children look forward to every year we make an event with friends, uh, even, you know, last year when things were kind of crazy, we were able to see people outside and, and hang out near the fire, but not too close. But we appreciate all the hard work that you guys put in, all the, Things that you do to help those different organizations and those, uh, food pantries throughout the area.
So thank you very much.
[00:12:46] Lori Yahr: Oh, thank you. We are proud of it. It’s a big undertaking, but, um, but everybody that’s involved is very proud of it.
[00:12:52] Fuzz Martin: Very good. All right. Well, have a great rest of the Enchantment in the Park season and enjoy the rest of the winter.
[00:12:58] Lori Yahr: Thank you. I think I’m on my way back down to the park right now.
All right.
[00:13:02] Fuzz Martin: Very good.
Thanks again to Lori Yahr of Enchantment in the Park for joining me on this week’s show. If you ever have an idea for an episode, do not hesitate to reach out. 15withfuzz at gmail. com or you can go to my website, 15withfuzz. com and Fill out the form. So again, 15withfuzz at gmail. com or the website is 15withfuzz.
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