Just Clowning Around or Northern Virginia (JCA) has a long history of clowning around in Northern Virginia. JCA’s first meeting was on Valentine’s Day, 1985. The original members of JCA included President, Steve “Pungo” Jiron; Vice President, Cathy “Puddles” Henry; Secretary, Jan “Tiptoes” Peters Treasurer, Mark “Gordo” Keiser & Ed “Pistachio” Reed.

JCA is Clown Alley #170 with Clowns of America, International (COAI). We encourage our members to join, COAI and other regional and national clown organizations.

Clown Education

Education is an important event at each Alley meeting. This includes presentation,
hands on sessions, and group discussion on topics related to being a clown and
entertainer. JCA is a club where we all come together each month to share and learn
from each other. New members are always welcome at any of our monthly meeting.

Each year, we pick educational topics for each of our meetings. Past topics have included:

• clown makeup and costumes
• make your own clown nose
• clown skits
• being silly with jokes, patter and entertainment
• making the most of your time in parades
• clowning as a business
• contracts or no contracts
• customer relations
• playing games
• working with puppets
• face painting
• balloon twisting
• storytelling
• using your new found props and magic tricks
• pocket magic
• entertaining senior citizens

Charity Events

Just Clowning Around of Northern Virginia (JCA) is a not for profit organization that provides clowns, face painters, and balloon twisters for other nonprofit organizations in Northern Virginia / Washington, DC area. JCA clowns are often available to help with non-profit, charitable, or volunteer organizations. JCA welcomes requests from charity groups to provide clowns for their events. When we help groups, we go as volunteers and will only help groups that don’t have a budget to hire entertainers. The events provide new members an opportunity to try out their clown skills and work along side more experienced clowns.

Very Important! – This is the small print

Please Read These Guidelines / Rules Before Requesting A Clown Or Clowns!

Just Clowning Around or Northern Virginia has has a set of rules and guidelines we are bound to follow in determining whether or not an event meets our guidelines and can be accepted as an alley gig for Just Clowning Around of Northern Virginia (JCA). Please keep in mind your event must not be an event where other entertainers (magicians, DJ, band, etc.) have been hired and paid to entertain side by side with the clowns from JCA. The key word is “volunteer!” All our members are volunteers who donate their time and talent to help out with events. We cannot make any guarantees that we will have anyone available to do an event. We typically ONLY do events within a reasonable driving distance from Fairfax, VA.

Even if we agree that your event qualifies for support from JCA, we cannot guarantee that our members will be available to come to your event. If you must have the assurance or guarantee that someone will attend your event, you should make the decision to directly hire someone to attend. By hiring and paying for your event, this is the only way you will be guaranteed their participation.

While we do not perform alley gigs as paid entertainers, our organization is a 501-c non-profit organization, so we will gladly accept a donation for the alley for our operating account. The donation can be any amount that you choose. Donations are not a requirement for us to do your gig, but are always greatly appreciated. The regular rate in this area for an hour of entertainment is $100/hour or more. You should know that any donation to JCA will be put to good use as we will in turn donate 75% to a local charity of our choosing at the end of the year.

Parades

Each year, JCA participates in several local parades. The parades give us a way to advertise our group. We announce that we welcome new members and can help them become the best clown they can be. We also tell people that we are available to help out with local charity events. The parades we most often participate in include:

• Falls Church Memorial Day Parade
• City of Fairfax Independence Day Parade
• Vienna Halloween Parade
• Reston Holiday Parade