Meadowlark Gardens Winter Walk of Lights features more than 500,000 festive LED lights, creating animated scenes and still-life vignettes. Photo courtesy of Meadowlark Botanical Gardens
Vienna’s holiday season runs through New Year’s Eve.
The social highlight is the second annual First Night Vienna celebration, sponsored and hosted by the Vienna Business Association and the Town of Vienna Department of Parks and Recreation. The family-friendly five-hour festival offers free entertainment at five venues.
In between Chanukah and New Year’s day are family-friendly events and activities to make the season sparkling bright. Some are free, some are not.
For updated calendar of events in the Vienna area, see www.connectionnewpapers.com.
FIRST NIGHT VIENNA takes over the historic Church Street corridor from 7 p.m. to midnight on Dec. 31 with multiple entertainment venues indoors and out, from Mill Street to Center Street.
Across the street from the Freeman House, and alongside the caboose, is the main tent featuring music, kids’ entertainment and activities and seating. First Night Vienna is family-focused with no admission charges.
First Night Vienna is alcohol-free; soft drinks only.
Firepits dot Church Street and hot beverages and snacks are offered at indoor venues.Commercial food trucks sell food for purchase starting at 6p.m.
VENUES open throughout evening include Church Street main tent: kids’ shows until kids’ toast at 8:59 p.m. Grown-up dance party begins at 9 p.m.; Caffe Amouri, pop music, Church Street; Concord Masonic Lodge, illusionist performing every hour, Church Street; Vienna Presbyterian Church Chapel, bluegrass; Vienna Presbyterian Church Great Hall, blues. For schedule of events and performances, go to http://www.firstnightvienna.org/.
CHANUKAH WONDERLAND, hosted by Chabad Tysons Jewish Center, runs from Dec. 21-24, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. On Dec. 21, Chanukah Wonderland offers an olive oil press demonstration at 11:30 a.m., and a “mad science” demonstration at 3 p.m. On Dec. 23, Chanukah Wonderland hosts a magic show at noon.
The Chabad features a Chanukah “superstore,” as well. Free admission to the “wonderland.”
Chabad Tysons is located at 2095 Chain Bridge Road, but, is really sited on a side street at the traffic light at McDonald’s near Old Courthouse Road, just outside the Vienna town limits.
MEADOWLARK GARDENS WINTER WALK OF LIGHTS, a winter wonderland of more than 500,000 LED lights in festive colors and scenes, runs through Sunday night, Jan. 4, 2015. Most scenes are animated.
Admission is $13 adults, $8 children ages 3-12, and children under 3 are free. To buy tickets and see photos of the spectacular, go to http://winterwalkoflights.com/. Coupons with a $1 Monday through Thursday discount are available.
Meadowlark Gardens, a Northern Virginia Regional Park, is sited facing Beulah Road at 9750 Meadowlark Gardens Court, Vienna.
A HOLIDAY MODEL TRAIN DISPLAY is presented at Colvin Run Mill, the barn, every Saturday and Sunday through Sunday, Dec. 28, from 11a.m. to 4p.m. G-gauge trains wind their way through a magical western town. Free of charge for viewing in barn.
Colvin Run Mill is located at 10017 Colvin Run Road, Great Falls. You can spot the mill from Leesburg Pike between Tysons and Reston.