Santa at the Tree, Carols in the Square, & Young Notes!

This evening rather a lot of Christmas season festivities occur all at once! The brightly lit tree on the green, carefully decorated by ageing Lions Club members who nevertheless managed to finish the job without mishap up several different ladders, has been a harbinger of these events for the past week or so.

At around 6pm, I understand, Santa will be taking requests from eager children, as he and his sleigh will be ensconced near to the lit tree. If the music system is working, it will all feel quite jolly! And then at around 7pm, the Backworth Colliery brass band will be accompanying the growing host of carollers who annually sing their hearts out in the square, under the lights of the Volunteer Fire Crew, from freshly printed carol sheets with large easier-to-read lettering! It has been known to snow on these carolling occasions, which always feels like a touch of Christmas magic. By about 7:45pm, everyone will be quite chilled (in the older sense of the term, I suspect), and folks will be welcomed into the King’s Head where Young Notes will present their own Christmas programme of songs they’ve been working on this past autumn.

So it promises to be a delightful evening, and a part of a continuing tradition of festive engagement that helps to make Allendale the vibrant village it is. With any luck, we’ll post some photographs of the event here by the end of the night.

I snuck up to the front, through a crowded King’s Head, to capture the Young Notes in full voice.