Just last week we published our annual section devoted to Ukrainian Debutante Balls. Featured on full-color pages were five debutante balls – from New Jersey, Illinois, Pennsylvania and New York – thanks to stories and photos sent in by their organizers. (Incidentally, all these organizers had advertised their debutante balls in our newspaper, so we knew they were taking place and made sure we had their reports in our special section.)
Our thanks go out to the writers and the photographers who shared their accounts and their lovely photos of these traditional events. Our congratulations and best wishes go to the debutantes, their families and their escorts. For the record, this was our 19th annual edition focusing on the Ukrainian community’s deb balls. We hope our readers enjoyed it, and we hope organizers will continue to work with us on these special sections in years to come. (FYI, the debutante balls sections are always published before Eastertime, so look for announcements of deadlines as soon as deb season ends each year.)
Right after we finished that special issue, we began planning for another perennially popular feature: our edition of “A Ukrainian Summer.” By now you’ve seen the advertisement printed in our newspaper and posted online on our Facebook page that announces the deadlines and release date for the 2019 special issue. As is our tradition at The Ukrainian Weekly, “A Ukrainian Summer” appears in the first issue of May.
“A Ukrainian Summer” encompasses a great variety of activities. Besides the summertime staple of camps to please youngsters with a variety of interests, there are workshops, educational offerings, cultural events and travel destinations. What’s more, the activities and events announced in that special supplement are geared to all age groups, beginning with preschoolers. We ask readers and organizers of these upcoming summer events to once again send us stories and photos that we can share with our readers to [email protected]. As always, we ask that you include the names of the persons who wrote the article and snapped the photos, as well as captions for each photo submitted. Do make sure the photos are high-quality, high-resolution shots, and please provide full names of all persons mentioned in your submission.
Included in “A Ukrainian Summer” is a calendar of Ukrainian festivals spanning the period from May through September. Last year that calendar listed 47 festivals held throughout North America, from New York and Montreal in the east, to San Diego and Surrey, British Columbia, in the west, plus points in between, for example, Belfield, N.D., and Regina, Saskatchewan. As well, there was a Ukrainian sports calendar of everything from soccer and golf, to volleyball, tennis and swimming, plus the Ukrainian Youth Games. The plan is to repeat these calendars for 2019, so make sure to send in your information to [email protected].
The deadline for all editorial materials is April 24; the issue date is May 5. (To see last year’s fabulous issue dated May 6, 2018, for examples of what such supplements contain, go to our website, www.ukrweekly.com.)
In addition, we gratefully welcome paid advertisements to be published as part of “A Ukrainian Summer.” These should be sent to our Advertising Department, [email protected]; the deadline is April 26.
We conclude this editorial message by extending a huge thank-you to you, our partners, for your anticipated cooperation in producing the 2019 edition of “A Ukrainian Summer.”