Celebrating 10 years of For the Love of Wine!
On Saturday, February 9, we celebrated 10 years of fine wine and live jazz at For the Love of Wine and it was amazing!
We started the evening off with the VIP reception, where sommeliers Stacey-Jo Strombecky and Juanita Roos presented Big Bold Reds – delicious and exclusive red wines. We shared trays of charcuterie and good company while learning more about where those wines came from and how they were made, and then made our way into the ballroom for the main event – For the Love of Wine!
Twenty-seven different wine agents presented over 100 different wines, something to please everyone, with a few tables offering hard liquors as well. While they sampled the wines, guests were treated to live jazz, courtesy of Sandro Dominelli’s trio and young singer Maddison Laine. Our auction had fantastic offerings, donated by many of Edmonton’s top restaurants, as well as hockey tickets, culinary packages, and art.
Our amazing raffle prize this year was a trip anywhere Air Canada flies, donated courtesy of Air Canada, and we were so excited when the winning ticket belonged to Tina Prins from the Blu Poppie, a long time supporter of the event! Thank you so much, Tina, for your amazing support over the years, and to Air Canada for this fantastic prize!
This year, we recognized the amazing contributions of the Chateau Louis Hotel and Conference Centre with the Heart of Gold Award, an annual award which recognizes the contributions of a supporter who has gone above and beyond to make this event a success.
At this year's event, to mark ten years, we also recognized the hard work and dedication of Troy Chalifoux, who first dreamed this fundraiser up over 10 years ago, was instrumental in putting it together, and has chaired the volunteer committee for this event every year since it first began (as well being an active member of our Board of Directors). To thank him, we surprised him with a Heart of Gold award of his very own!
It’s been ten years since we hosted the first For the Love of Wine, and we are so grateful for the support we have had from our community for this event, particularly the wine agents who supply their products and expertise, and the restaurants who donate to our auction, year after year. Thank you so much to Color de Vino, for partnering with us on this event again, and to our other sponsors, Lexus of Edmonton, Global Edmonton, the DoubleTree by Hilton, Avenue Magazine, Production World, and Amplomedia. We are so grateful to Sandro Dominelli, who has performed at every For the Love of Wine since the beginning, and to our volunteers, who work tirelessly to help us put this event together. Thank you so much to every guest who attended this year and made our 10th anniversary such a success.
We could not keep the doors open at Kids Kottage without the support of our community. Thank you to all the sponsors, donors, volunteers and guests who have embraced our cause and this event over the past 10 years.
Thank you!
