12/15/2025
Hi all!! With our 🌟2nd Annual🌟 C2C weekend complete, I just want to post my sincerest thank you to all who helped put these events on, participated, helped share the word etc! We started planning these events in August/September and it comes with a ton of work behind the scenes by SO MANY people. Unfortunately, we had to cancel the carriage rides and the trolley rides due to the extremely frigid temps but overall the weekend went off without a hitch🥶😢We learned a lot as a committee this year and I learned a lot about delegating and trying not to be such a control freak (still working on this LOL)🙈🤩
Special thank you to Manson Public Library for putting on the sweetest Christmas themed story hour Thursday Night! Alex and Megan truly did so much to make so many fun things come together for all the kiddos📚🎅🏻🍪
Another thank you to all the businesses and vendors who helped make Small Business Night a success! The weather wasn’t ideal but our community showed up and it was a great night for getting out and shopping local this holiday season! 🛍️🛒
Saturday’s activities wouldn’t be complete without the Spirit of Joy Tour of Churches!! Thanks so much to those who helped put this together at each of our towns churches - Augustana Lutheran Church, Lifepoint Church, Our Savior Methodist Church, St. Paul Lutheran Church and St Thomas Catholic Church✝️⛪️
The bright spot of the weekend and a crowd favorite…the weekend couldn’t be complete without the return of our Lighted Christmas Parade!! Special thank you goes out to Russell Weller who announced the parade entries! Other special thank yous to the Manson Police Department, especially Officers Hansch and Mulder for heading our parade, the Manson Volunteer Fire Department, especially Richard Hall and David Hoeppner for driving fire trucks and hauling Santa Claus🎅🏻, and all our parade entries! (I will make a separate post with all the entries instead of listing them here bc I do not want to forget anyone!). I believe we counted 16 participants in the parade this year which was absolutely amazing for such a cold night!
Our Sunday events went off without a hitch starting with the Pancake Breakfast hosted by the Manson Volunteer Fire Department with the help of the MNW Dance Team! Pancakes were delicious and our hosts were fabulous as always! Thank you all again for feeding us a yummy breakfast to end the weekend out right!🚒🥞💃🏻
Our wonderful weekend ended when Santa Claus arrived via HELICOPTER 🤩🚁🎅🏻 to hang out at the Manson Chamber of Commerce’s Hometown Christmas Event! Many groups worked together to offer activities, snacks, and holiday fun. Thanks to ALL who made this celebration happen.
A few special thank yous for behind the scenes work that goes unseen. Santa Claus🎅🏻 who arranged the helicopter entrance with the help of the Manson Fire Department and our Calhoun County EMA Richard Hall. Thank you to Brielle Wiese and Hunter Voith for helping put up barricades for parade. Thank you to Denise Heimgartner and Justin Widlund for their hard work setting up and doing all the behind the scenes work on that. Big thanks goes out to Caitlin Sturhenberg and MNW Schools for sending out our Schedule of Events to families across the district. And lastly, a HUGE shoutout to my awesome husband, Drew Samuelson, and his snow helpers for moving snow allllllll day Saturday so all these events could happen. Your hard work DOES NOT go unnoticed and our town is so lucky to have you🙌🏻🥳
Thank you isn’t enough for all those who dedicate themselves to this event. So many people put in hours, days, and even weeks of their time to make all this come together and I appreciate every single one of you immensely. What started as my crazy idea of turning Manson into a Hallmark movie is slowly growing and it’s only year 2! I truly hope we can continue to build this into one big weekend of core memories for the youth, families and all the members of our community for years to come. It has been so heart warming to see everyone come together for one main reason, to make Manson sparkle at Christmas🥰🎄
Until next year, lots of love and Merry Christmas to you all ❤️ Madison Samuelson, Head of Countdown to Christmas 🎄
