Hallways full as Holiday Market returns to Prince Charles School

Craig Bakay | Dec 04, 2019

“It’s been steady,” Parents Council chair and 14th annual holiday market organizer Ali Williams said Saturday morning as Prince Charles Public School was full of holiday shoppers, vendors and people making merry. “It’ll probably pick up once the (Sydenham) Santa Claus Parade is over.”

It did pick up indeed.

For the past seven years, the school and the Frontenac Farmers Market have combined to put on the annual sale.

For the school, it represents a major fundraiser.

“We’ve raised money for sports equipment, bike desks for kids who have high energy so they can bike while doing their school work, school trips, culinary class, wood working and musical gear,” Williams said. “It all comes back to the school.”

Williams said she has a lot of help putting this on but Tab Morton said it’s mostly Williams.

“Ali is the vast majority of this,” Morton said. “We play a very small support role.

“She’s the main driver.”

“She’s lying,” said Williams.

Well, there were a lot of teachers, parents and such that seemed to be busy. Heck, they even had two Santa Claus’s even though both of them tried to convince the reporter they were actually the same person in two different places at once.

The annual event is usually the first full weekend in December, but they decided to try it a weekend earlier this year to avoid conflicts with other events.

“But it seems no matter when we have it, there’s something else going on,” Williams said. “But it is nice having the partnership with the Frontenac Farmers Market.”

David Bates, the self-admitted “Poobah” of the market at the moment, agreed.

“There’s parking way up the streets,” he said. “We’re hearing from some of our cornerstone vendors that we’re setting records.”

He said the holiday market bodes well for the future of the Frontenac Farmers Market and they may be looking at moving to McMullen Park for next season.