Lansing community wins at Family Game Night

The seventh annual Lansing Community Celebration dazzled town residents and visitors this past weekend with its “Family Game Night” theme and its focus on community ties.

The event, which was born out of the Lansing bicentennial celebration of 2017, featured carnival rides, plenty of fair foods at reasonable prices, a scintillating fireworks show, skilled carnival artists making balloon animals come to life, music curated by local DJs and even an exotic animals show put on by Dan The Snakeman.

The celebration, which livened up the town for an entire weekend, is a labor of love put on by several community partners, including the Lansing Events Committee. The group, comprising about 11 town residents, is skilled at bringing attractions together and planning what amounts to a labor of love dedicated to Lansing’s closely knit community.

“We’re so excited for it,” Valerie McMillen, a longtime resident of the town of Lansing and a member of the committee, said on Sept. 5, the first day of the celebration.

Some of the attractions over the course of the weekend included Hilby the Skinny German Juggle Boy, a resident of Tompkins County with a world-renowned act. Hilby’s comedic act features juggling on atop unicycles of all shapes and sizes and manipulating objects ranging from bowling balls to hedge trimmers. 

“A powerful and spellbinding collage of superb technical skill and wacky comedy in the tradition of vaudeville. If you have seen him before, you know he is not to be missed,” reads the bio on Hilby’s website.

The skilled performer has delighted crowds from around the world, performing at theaters, colleges, cruise ships and fairgrounds.

“Last year he was there. I think every single person at the celebration was watching him,” McMillen said. “He’s so good, and he lives in Lansing. He gets on stilts and starts throwing stuff in the air … the whole nine yards.”

There were also karate professionals demonstrating their craft for the crowds at the celebration, as well as dancers from the Crane Irish Dance academy. Crane Irish Dance is a regional academy that offers competitive and noncompetitive Irish dance lessons to children and adults in Auburn, Ithaca and King Ferry.

There were also activities like bingo honoring the theme of this year’s celebration: “Family Game Night.”

“We got approved to have our bingo license, so we’re going to have some games of bingo,” McMillen said before the event. “It’s like rapid-fire bingo. We’re going to try it here and see if we can pull it off. We’re really excited about that.”

McMillen said she was very excited for the annual parade, which also follows the yearly theme.

“We have a great parade lineup this year,” McMillen noted. The parade is meant only for floats affiliated with the Lansing Central School District. 

“There’s a $500 prize for the winner with the best float,” McMillen said. “They can use it however they want. Floats will have to follow the theme, and our team of judges will decide the winner. This is a great thing for us to bring to the community.”

The judges are typically volunteers from around the community. For instance, members of Lansing town government sometimes volunteer their time to rate floats. This, McMillen said, truly highlights the togetherness of the community, something she noticed shortly after moving to Lansing. McMillen and her family have lived in Lansing since 1976. 

“Everybody knows everybody,” she said. “Everybody is either a cousin or an uncle, or just family. There is just a lot of support here for one another.”

Lansing at Large appears every week in Tompkins Weekly. Send story ideas to editorial@vizellamedia.com. Contact Eddie Velazquez at edvel37@gmail.com or on X (formerly Twitter) @ezvelazquez.

In brief:

The Lansing Community Library will host a movie night for adults on Sept. 28 at 6 p.m. The library will show “The Fall Guy.”

“Grown-ups, take a break, decompress, and join us in the town hall for a free movie night for adults,” reads a post on the library website. “We will be showing The Fall Guy, starring Ryan Gosling and Emily Blunt. Put this on your calendar for a fun date night, friend meet-up, or much-needed time to yourself. Light snacks will be provided.”