Each and every holiday this wonderful hedge dragon lights up to share the joy! It is across the street from the Moore Branch of the Tacoma Public Library (215 S 56th Ave Tacoma, WA 98408). I truly admire folks that go all out for the holidays! This holiday ledge dragon even has a Rudolph red nose! 🙂
This cool, rainy Saturday dear daughter and I went off to the DuPont Holiday Bazaar, which was held at Pioneer Middle School http://www.steilacoom.k12.wa.us/Domain/9. My Facebook photographer friend, Kate Lynch, was there and I was so happy to meet her face to face. 🙂 The holiday bazaar had quality, interesting items for sale and the vendors seemed unusually, sincerely nice.
I hadn’t realized that schools in DuPont (ok, the only public school in DuPont) is part of the Steilacoom School District. It is a nice looking school and recently built.
St. Leo’s at 1323 Yakima Ave., Tacoma, is having their annual Fair Trade Market this weekend (Friday 4-7pm, Saturday Nov 17, 1-7pm and Sunday Nov 18, 9am-2pm). There were plenty of vendors, both Fair Trade and local folks. The building was constructed in 1912 and the architect was C. Frank Mahon. I remember when we first moved to Tacoma, I would attend Tacoma Actor’s Guild plays in the theater here. I admire the social justice program and food bank at St. Leo’s
As we usually do, dear daughter and I celebrated New Year’s Eve at Tacoma’s First Night in Downtown Tacoma. We drove to the Dome Transit Center and caught the Link to the theater district and then we kicked up our heals! It is really a top notch event. The weather was cold, but not frigid and there was no rain (a small miracle). I ran into a bunch of folks that I knew, but dear daughter seemed to know almost everybody! She declared that her schoolmates owned the downtown domain!
The new place for the day is the Pythian Temple at 924-926 1/2 Broadway, Tacoma. The building was constructed in 1906 for the Commencement Lodge No. 7 of the Knights of the Pythias. On August 23, 1985, Pythian Temple was added to the National Register of Historic Places. The meeting room is upstairs and is amazing, with dark carved woods and lovely frescoes and a huge organ.
For more on the Temple, including some historic photos, go to here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pythian_Temple_%28Tacoma,_Washington%29
This is my sixth building that was designed by Frederick Heath, architect and named after the 25th President of the United States, William McKinley. The others are:
http://blog.firsttries.com/?p=2012 Oakland School
http://blog.firsttries.com/?p=1961 Urban Grace
http://blog.firsttries.com/?p=1335 Titlow Lodge
http://blog.firsttries.com/?p=2370 Tacoma Public School’s CAB
http://blog.firsttries.com/?p=2374 McKinley School
When I heard that Zoolights at Point Defiance Zoo & Aquarium was featuring a scuba diving Santa on select days, I knew that we had to go! So, despite the fairly heavy rain, yesterday dear daughter, her dear friend and I went off to the zoo. It was really great! The rain mostly stopped and it was pretty temperate. I thought parking would be a snap, but the lot was almost full. Must be the pull of Scuba Santa! There was a short wait to see Santa, but when we got in we had a pretty good view and didn’t feel rushed. Everybody was having fun and the kids really got a kick out of it!
The house at 202 Ramsdale in Fircrest is considered one of the best decorated Halloween Houses according to the Tacoma News Tribune. So, on our way elsewhere, we stopped and snapped a quick photo. It wasn’t until later, at home, that I realized the pumpkin head figure that is the focal point of the display is actually one of those carved bears that Fircrest is known for! That’s kind of cool. I throw a pumpkin frame around the whole thing because I didn’t think that overkill was a concern 😀 And while I was at it, I added a skeleton with a candy corn frame!
The Burkee-Francois House at 2326 South L Street was constructed in 1904 and is on the Tacoma, Washington State and National Register of Historic Places. More information can be found here http://wspdsmap.ci.tacoma.wa.us/website/HistoricMap/scripts/summary.asp?ID=%28346%29&map=%2847.2384900131,%20-122.450535574%29
I was delighted to see that this wonderful historic home is decorated for Halloween!
I stopped at Fred Meyers at 4504 South 19th Street, Tacoma for some carpet cleaning fluid that they sell. I was naively surprised to find an entire row of Christmas merchandise! Well, OK then.
Originally uploaded by Gexydaf
On the way home from the almost last holiday gathering my family stopped to admire the City of Tacoma’s holiday tree in front of the Pantages Theater. We also tool a quick peak at the art displayed in the windows across the street. It was a lovely Christmas for us and I hope the same is true for all of you. Peace.
