Annual Event Returning, With A Few Changes—

Newtown Savings Bank Presents The 26th Annual Holiday Festival

To Benefit Newtown Youth & Family Services

By Shannon Hicks

For the 26th year, an early December holiday festival will be presented so that all of Newtown and residents from surrounding towns can gather to continue celebrating the holiday season.

The 2011 Holiday Festival event will take place Sunday, December 4, and will welcome returning favorites and present some new offerings. It will also note the hiatus for at least one year of a longstanding event.

The Newtown Savings Bank Presents The 26th Annual Holiday Festival To Benefit Newtown Youth & Family Services — the formal name of the Newtown Holiday Festival — will be focused on Main Street, with events taking place at C.H. Booth Library and Edmond Town Hall.

The festival, filled with family friendly events, will run from 11 am to 5 pm.

“We are grateful to our title sponsor, Newtown Savings Bank, for presenting the 26th Holiday Festival to benefit Newtown Youth & Family Services,” said Festival Chairperson and NYFS Secretary Layne Lescault. “Newtown Savings Bank [is also sponsoring] the Teddy Bear Tea, a successor to the Victorian Tea. Their support of our agency has been essential to our mission.”

Candice Foster, executive director of NYFS, added: “We are looking forward to celebrating with the community and families that support our mission. I have even heard that Santa is stopping by to wish everyone a Happy Healthy Year!”

Festival tickets are $15 per person, or $30 for a family four-pack (two adults and two children), with tickets for additional children $5 each. Tickets are on sale now, available at Everything Newtown, 61 Church Hill Road; C.H. Booth Library, 25 Main Street; and Newtown Savings Bank’s two Newtown branches (39 Main Street and 228 South Main Street, within Sand Hill Plaza) and Bethel branch at 68 Stony Hill Road (Route 6).

C.H. Booth Library will be home to the Gingerbread House Contest and the Festival of Trees, both popular returning events.

Meanwhile, the town hall, at 45 Main Street, will be home to The Teddy Bear Tea, a different take on the Victorian Tea of previous years; Mix & Match Free Throw Tournament, a brand-new event; two performances of Nutcracker Suite Ballet by Jennifer Johnston’s Malenkee Ballet Repertoire Company/Newtown Centre of Classical Ballet, a perennial favorite; and the debut of The Stray Kats Theatre Company at the Holiday Festival, who will offer a trio of one-act plays.

The performances will all be in the town hall’s theater. The ballet performances will be at noon and 2 pm, and the Stray Kats — who have traditionally done their readings in the Alexandria Room — will take the stage on the building’s main floor at 4 pm.

The Teddy Bear Tea, in the Alexandria Room, will again be filled with music and plenty of tea and breads. The new focus will be on children and their favorite teddy bears (or stuffed animals). A Best Dressed Bear Contest is also planned. Children should bring their favorite teddy bear to the Tea by 2 pm, when a winner will be selected.

New Events

Town Historian Dan Cruson will lead Historic Walking Tours of Main Street.

According to Ms Lescault, Mr Cruson will lead participants from the front steps of Edmond Town Hall, north to the Whalen residence at 65 Main Street, across Main to the Soldiers & Sailors Monument, and then travel south to the flagpole. Groups will cross Main Street again, and return to the town hall.

Each tour will last approximately 45 minutes, with Mr Cruson’s focus to be on the history and architecture along the route. Tours will begin at 11 am and 1 and 3 pm, and are included in the cost of a Holiday Festival ticket.

The Mix & Match Free Throw Tournament will be in the town hall’s gymnasium, and will have adult-child teams in four age categories competing for prizes. The event is being coordinated by Newtown Youth Academy.

“We have some amazing prizes for that,” said Ms Foster, “including a $175 gift certificate toward NYA Basketball Camp.”

Also new this year is a Decorated Door & House Contest, open to all residents of town.

“This is a nice new event that we’re excited about because while the festival itself is centered around Main Street, this contest can be entered and won by anyone in town,” Ms Foster said.

“One of the toughest things about the festival is we have so much to offer, we cannot including anything too far off Main Street,” Ms Lescault agreed.

For this contest, residents are invited to decorate the front door or their entire home, and e-mail a photo to Kaitlyn Johnson (KJohnson@NewtownYouthAndFamilyServices.org) by December 2. The photos will be printed and posted at Edmond Town Hall and on Sunday during the Holiday Festival, the public will be invited to vote for their favorite.

Returning Favorites

As mentioned above, the Gingerbread House Contest will again be part of the Holiday Festival.

Families, friends, clubs, and organizations will also be welcome to enter their creations. Those who would like a bit of advice on building a gingerbread dwelling are invited to participate in a Gingerbread House Workshop being hosted by the library on Thursday, December 1. Cost is $8 per person (which will then be deducted from the price of a Holiday Festival ticket), and the library will provide everything needed to make a house.

“Completed houses can be entered that afternoon into the contest, they can be taken home to finish, or they can just be taken home to keep,” said Ms Foster.

Participation in the workshop is not a prerequisite to entering the Holiday Festival event.

“Families can enter the Holiday Festival contest without taking the workshop,” Ms Foster said.

Details and guidelines for those planning to enter the Gingerbread House Contest have been posted on NYFS’s website. Visit NewtownYouthAndFamilyServices.org, click on Information, and then Special Events. (Details about the Festival of Trees are also on this web page.)

C.H. Booth Library will again be home to The Festival of Trees, which actually offers visitors a choice of decorated miniature (tabletop to five feet tall) trees and wreaths. Businesses, organizations, groups, and individuals are all invited to enter this event.

Entries for this event will be dropped off at the library on Friday, December 2, so that the public can view and begin bidding on the trees on Saturday.

The Festival of Trees will run Saturday and Sunday, December 3 and 4.

House Tours On Hiatus

Anyone who is familiar with previous Holiday Festivals has probably noticed one omission to this year’s event: the house tours have not been mentioned.

Popular in the past, the tours through private homes on and in the vicinity of Main Street will not be part of this year’s festival.

“The house tours are on hiatus,” Ms Lescault confirmed. “They will return, eventually, and they will be revamped like the rest of the festival. This year we are focusing on events that families can enjoy together.”

Two offerings that will remain on Sunday’s schedule are the Advent Service of Lessons & Carols at Trinity Episcopal Church and an open house at Matthew Curtiss House. These events are both free and open to the public.

Trinity’s service will begin at 2 pm in the sanctuary at 36 Main Street.

The Matthew Curtiss House, at 44 Main Street, is the headquarters of Newtown Historical Society. Costumed docents traditionally offer tours of the 18th Century saltbox construction, which will be decorated in historic fashion.

Newtown Youth & Family Services (NYFS) is dedicated to helping children and families achieve their highest potential. The nonprofit agency combines clinical services and positive youth development programs to provide a continuum of care to residents of the greater Newtown area.

NYFS is licensed by the Department of Children & Families as an outpatient psychiatric clinic for children and by the Department of Public Health as a psychiatric outpatient clinic for adults and as a facility for the care or treatment of substance abusive or dependent persons. NYFS is accredited by the Council on Accreditation.

To find out more about NYFS or the Holiday Festival, call 203-270-4335 or visit www.NewtownYouthAndFamilyServices.org.