Holiday Homecoming
On December 2nd, 2017, Colchester Parks and Recreation held the annual Holiday Homecoming on the town green. The Holiday Homecoming happens every year and the main highlight is Santa riding around on a fire engine throughout the day until 5:00, where he proceeds to sit under the gazebo for the kids of Colchester to take pictures with him. This is also the day that Colchester lights their Christmas tree. This always occurs on the first Saturday of December each year.
Set up for the event started at around 3:30 p.m. Officer Suchecki collected toy donations for children who otherwise would not get presents this holiday season. Colchester Parks and Recreation set up a booth selling their annual Colchester ornaments. This year they were of the Colchester Historical Society Building. This booth also had candy canes that were handed out to the children. The Colchester Lions Club had a booth with an assortment of free cookies and hot apple cider. This booth also collected food donations from the town. There was also a large bonfire, and the Colchester Fire Department set up a table with steamy hot chocolate. DJ Montez arrived in his van and put on some great Christmas tunes.
Families started arriving at 4:30 p.m. People immediately got in line to see Santa before the sirens of his fire engine were even heard. The line stretched about a quarter of the way across the green.
The first performance were holiday songs sung by St. Andrew's Children's Choir. They sounded great, and looked festive in their Santa hats. Doreens Dance Center also put on a small performance. Then, Mr. Art Shilosky, Colchester’s First Selectman welcomed Santa to the gazebo. Everybody waved and Santa got off to sit on his large red chair that was set up in the gazebo. There was a beautiful winter scene backdrop behind his chair which made for wonderful photos. Once children started visiting Santa Claus and the line started to move, Dj Monetz announced that it was finally time to light the tree. The Town of Colchester joined the Dj in counting down to the lighting of the tree. The tree lit up and the crowd of people gathered gasped in sync at the beautiful display of lights.
Soon after the tree was lit, while kids were still filing in to visit Santa, the Colchester Continental Marching Band captured everyone’s attention with their loud but joyous holiday songs.
The whole event was over by about 6:00, when most of the kids had gotten their pictures with Santa and left with wonderful smiles upon their faces, ready for the Holiday Season to come.
