Christmas at Radness Ensues is whatever you want it to be.  This year, the all-ages community center held a free dinosaur-themed potluck Christmas gathering from 11 a.m. to midnight. Anybody was welcome in the 2,200 square foot center at 3837 River Rd N. to eat food or participate in a number of activities like arts and crafts, watching movies and playing music. The first thing guests encountered walking through the door at Radness Ensues is a silly 6-month-old French bulldog named Lliira. Lliira’s owner, Becka Brisbin, is the organization’s founder. Brisbin started the program earlier this year and on Wednesday was wearing a green dinosaur onesie adorned with buttons that gently clanked as she walked around greeting guests. “We want you here. You deserve to be alive and you deserve to be happy and you deserve to be in good company and in a safe space,” Brisbin said, describing what Radness Ensues is all about. Radness Ensues founder Becka Brisbin and her good friend Sarah Katreen Hoggatt at the Radness Ensues Christmas potluck event. (Joe Siess/Salem Reporter) Brisbin, a co-founder of Punx in the Park, started the center to include an internship program for young people ages 14 to 25, where they can learn how to design and make custom screen prints for shirts, hats and skateboards, along with barista skills, button-making, how to manage bands and businesses and a space to perform music. Brisbin also founded Becka Makes Buttons, a formerly stand-alone button shop that used to be located on Southeast Commercial Street. She now operates the button center inside Radness Ensues.  Salem-area community center will help young people learn music, screenprinting and business skills The center itself is covered wall-to-wall in art. Whimsical creatures and other curiosities dangle from the ceiling or adorn the space. Immediately to the right of the entrance is the center’s self-serve coffee nook, and along the side wall is the button shop. There is a Little Free Library, and a gift shop among many other surprises. In the back of the space there is a stage where anybody can experiment with a variety of available instruments in a judgment-free environment.  Brisbin said she settled on the dinosaur theme partly because of how learning about the prehistoric creatures fosters a sense that anything is possible. She also said it appeals to all ages and there are few people who could object to dinosaurs as a theme.  Jennifer Gordon and Shane Frost hang out at Radness Ensues on Wednesday during the organization’s Christmas potluck. (Joe Siess/Salem Reporter) The Christmas potluck event, like the Radness Ensues Thanksgiving gathering, was open to anybody who wants to find a place where they feel accepted.  “The holidays can be really hard for a lot of people and the highest rates of suicide usually happen today and on Thanksgiving,” Brisbin said. “I put no barriers and no expectations because I think for the holidays a lot of people have a lot of high expectations where you have to have a good Christmas or Merry Christmas and all that, but for some people that is actually not the case. There is all this pressure to have this amazing day and for a lot of us it is just another day.”  Sarah Katreen Hoggatt, a Salem artist and writer, was at Radness Ensues on Wednesday. She said she has known Brisbin for about two years and the two have become good friends.  “It means to have a place where you are completely welcome, loved and cared for. It is a community and it is a space where people can come however they are feeling that day and feel wanted,” Hoggatt said of Redness Ensues. “I love how there are lots of different options of what you can do. You can bring something with you. I brought my guitar. Or you can participate in what everybody else is doing. It is very freeing. Becka is so warm and inviting to everybody. She has one of the kindest, most generous hearts I know.”  Hoggatt said because of the neutral environment, the Christmas event is ideal also for people who might celebrate holidays other than Christamas.  Sable Obray-Hernandez and her two children Journey, who turns two in February, and River, 5, were enjoying the arts and crafts station on Wednesday. Obray-Hernandez said she found the event online and after opening presents on Christmas morning figured it would be a fun community-oriented activity for her and her children.  “I love how the kids can be creative and they can wander and do what they want,” Obray-Hernandez said. “I think it is really cool what she is doing. I think it is awesome. It’s really cool to get creative with other people.”  Sable Obray-Hernandez enjoys some quality time with her children, Journey, almost 2, and River, 5, at the arts and crafts station during the Radness Ensues Christmas potluck event. (Joe Siess/Salem Reporter) Brisbin said at the Thanksgiving event roughly 30 people showed up, many of them displaced young people and families who needed a place to be together in a comfortable environment.  “It is just a way to chill and relax and just be, without being out in the cold or having to be in an uncomfortable situation with family or not with family. We don’t ask what the situation is, we just welcome people and love on them and if they want to chit chat they can do that, if they want to hang out in the corner by themselves, they can do that too,” Brisbin said. “We like to have our doors open so people have a safe, sober alternative to go to instead of being outside or being somewhere where they just don’t want to be. Even if they are not really sure where they want to be, they are still welcome to come hang out and just be.” Radness Ensues is open regularly from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. on Wednesdays, Fridays, and Saturdays, and from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. on Thursdays and from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Sundays. More information can be found on the organization’s Facebook page, and a full events calendar can be found online here. Radness Ensues’ logo painted on the back wall of the organization’s community center at 3837 River Rd N. in Keizer. (Joe Siess/Salem Reporter) Contact reporter Joe Siess: [email protected] or 503-335-7790.A MOMENT MORE, PLEASE – If you found this story useful, consider subscribing to Salem Reporter if you don’t already. Work such as this, done by local professionals, depends on community support from subscribers. Please take a moment and sign up now – easy and secure: SUBSCRIBE. The post Radness Ensues provides a welcoming space to be on Christmas, and any other day appeared first on Salem Reporter.