The yearly
tradition of the New Orleans
Ernest N. Morial
Convention Center hosting NOLA ChristmasFest is continuing this
year, though with a now-expected spin on it. NOLA ChristmasFest 2020 is
going virtual, but it still has a very wide variety of fun activities and entertaining
segments for children of all ages. Completely free of charge, the
CapitalOne-presented virtual celebrations will kick off Friday, December 11,
and run all the way until the following Friday, December 18. You can view the
many different activities by visiting nolachristmasfest.com, and keep in mind that they are still actively updating the
schedule with more events as we draw nearer to Christmastime. The New Orleans
Christmas tradition for seven years now is dubbing its new virtual iteration
"Santa's Little Helpers."
Seeing
as Zoom has risen as the most ubiquitous method of general communication during
our extended battle with COVID-19, ChristmasFest, too, is using it as the
service through which all of their activities will be streamed. Most will range
from 20 to 60 minutes, and admission is free for you or your child to enjoy a
fun holiday stream. The "Santa's Little Helpers" program will have a
variety of engaging activities for your child, such as an "Ask the Elf"
live chat, Christmas Cardio Dance, Holiday Game Night, Family Elf-ercise, story
time, intro to Irish dancing, and more. Watching with materials and supplies on hand to follow along
with instructors and join in on activities such as making salt dough and other
crafts can help increase your child's engagement and be more fun all around.
ChristmasFest is providing some
much-needed optimism in these times, both with their continued operation as
well as their pragmatic planning. A brief investigation of their website will
reveal that they have already begun planning for next year's ChristmasFest,
which is planned to be entirely in-person and will have tried-and-true kid
favorites including photos with Santa and gingerbread house-making. Right now, with current capacity restrictions in place,
we are unfortunately stuck with digital versions of almost everything that we
usually look forward to in-person, but we can take solace in the fact that there is now,
at least, a light at the end of the tunnel.
For
more information or to register for events, go to nolachristmasfest.com.
