The Festival de Joie is about to take over Lewiston.

We’re ready for six great days of fun marking the region’s Franco-American heritage. Now, if the weather will only cooperate.

The festival itself doesn’t begin until Friday, but the festivities begin tonight. Prelude 2004 gets going at 7 p.m. with a concert at the Franco-American Heritage Center.

The Prelude continues Wednesday and Thursday with parades, concerts, concessions and vendors. Lower Lisbon Street will be closed to cars from 5 to 10:30 p.m. both nights for the celebration.

The main event kicks off Friday, with activities centered around Lewiston’s Railroad Park. There will be three stages of live entertainment, a centralized location for crafts and a play land for children.

The C’est Si Bon Caf food tent, known for its crepes and other international cuisine, opens at 7 a.m. Friday for breakfast, and the entertainment begins at 5 p.m. that day. The fun continues through Sunday, with the closing ceremony scheduled for 5 p.m.

Last year, heavy rain took its toll on attendance and revenue. Organizers are hoping for better this year and a return to the crowds that have topped 12,000 a day. More than 200 volunteers will be working to make sure things run as smoothly as possible.

The Festival de Joie celebrates this area’s Franco-American culture and the legions of workers who came here from Canada to work in the mills. For six days, Lewiston pays special attention to its history and its heritage.

It’s a great chance for residents to learn about the city, to meet their neighbors and to have a good time.

Visions of tomorrow

Janis Plummer doesn’t live in Maine anymore. But she hasn’t forgotten about us.

Plummer, a 23-year-old Oxford native, developed a vision of what Norway could be for her master’s project at the Savannah College of Art and Design in Georgia.

In the world Plummer created, Norway would be revitalized with a performing arts center and mixed-use development at the old C.B Cummings mill site.

Of course, Plummer’s design wasn’t done under the constraints of paying for the ideas and recruiting new businesses. But as an exercise in what could be, it’s a worthwhile endeavor.

For now, Plummer will make her life in South Carolina where she will work for an architectural firm.

The fact that Norway and Maine are still on her mind makes it more likely she’ll return one day, bringing new ideas with her.