Cloudview Farms celebrates summer, sunflowers, and community

EPHRATA — Hundreds of community members came out Saturday to Cloudview Farm for the Second Annual Summer Sunflower Fest, which featured numerous local vendors, booths and activity stations for children and adults.

“We have grown our reach and had double the amount of people that attended from the first year,” said Julie Johnston, Cloudview’s education and community coordinator.

Less than an hour into the event, Johnston said that they had about 150 people already purchase tickets and come to the event and that they had to mow a new area next to the parking spots for additional space.

“We did a radio ad this year. Just the word of mouth and our social media has helped bring more awareness to everyone,” said Johnston. “We’re rotary club members, so we make sure that we get out in the community with them and they help spread the word.”

In addition to the increase in event attendees, Johnston said they had new businesses and vendors sponsor and attend this year’s fest, some local to Grant County as well as some from outside the county. Johnston said that these organizations help with auction items for fundraising, monetary donations and Cloudview’s scholarship assistance for the nonprofit’s youth programs.

Other partners with Cloudview also attended the event, such as Katie Jo Buchanan with the Youth Empowerment Program, which is hosting summer community art classes out of the Soap Lake Community and Senior Center. Buchanan said Cloudview asked her to run the paint-a-pot station and promote the Youth Empowerment Program at the Sunflower Fest.

“They’re painting the pots and then planting in them…We’ve got zinnias, succulents, and then the sage,” said Buchanan. “It’s going great. I’m happy to be here. I always like getting out into the community.”

Aside from arts and crafts, event attendees could also plant sunflower seeds, explore a maze cut into a patch of tall sunflowers and shop at local vendor booths. Johnston said that another new aspect of this year’s event was the children’s story time, hosted by the Ephrata Public Library.

Linda Gustafson, an attendee of Saturday’s event, said that she and her family had heard about the Sunflower Fest through Facebook and decided to come down to Ephrata from Odessa to get a photo of four generations of their family in front of the sunflower maze. Gustafson said that the event was going well and seemed to have a good turnout.

“It’s nice,” she said. “I like it. We’ll do it again. It’s lots of fun.”

Angie Thompson, a local resident of Ephrata, said that she was attending the event to support local organizations and shop at the vendors, and because it was something to do — she said there weren’t that many events in Ephrata and that she wished there were more.

“There’s small things around, you just have to know about them,” said Thompson. “But it’s fun because it’s not so crowded in a small town.”

Among the various local vendors was the mobile truck Street Sweets Ice Cream and More, which services Ephrata and Soap Lake. Tiffany Mullings, co-owner of Street Sweets, said that the truck has frequently worked with Cloudview since opening just over a year ago and that Cloudview opened a stand for Street Sweets during the business’s one-year anniversary in June.

“Cloudview has been extremely supportive of us since day one. They invite us to all of their events,” said Mullings. “Mostly we come out here because we like to support other small businesses in the community.”

Mullings also mentioned the increase in turnout compared to the farm’s first Sunflower Fest.

“We’ve been doing really great today, I think probably better than last year,” she said. “We’re not even at the hot part yet…It’s been pretty brisk this morning, so we’re pleased with that.”

The Sunflower Fest also featured baked goods from Cloudview Kitchen, the farm’s sibling business in Soap Lake, as well as an interactive digital scavenger hunt for attendees wanting to explore the farm.

Johnston, who has worked at Cloudview for roughly three and a half years, said last year was not just the first year for the Summer Sunflower Fest, but also when Cloudview started all of their seasonal events back up again after the COVID-19 pandemic. Johnston said that she had wanted to get the events running again and thought a sunflower fest would be a good choice for a summer event.

“The events that we do, our seasonal events — the spring, summer, and fall — are to bring community together,” said Johnston. “That’s the main goal, is to bring community together and to get them out into nature and bring them to the farm.”

Gabriel Davis may be reached at [email protected]. Download the Columbia Basin Herald app on iOS and Android.