Our Oxford Winter Light Night Festival Experience

As the nights draw in and there's more dark than light it's time to switch on the Christmas lights. For a few years now Oxford has celebrated the approach of Winter by putting on a Winter Light Night Festival. This festival sees a lantern parade, acrobats, singing, dancing, musicians and actors and actresses coming together to celebrate with visitors and those that live in the city.

We began our evening with a bus ride into town and got off at Bonn Square opposite the Westgate Shopping Centre.. The place has changed a lot over the years and some may argue that it's bigger and better than it's ever been.

In the square a couple of actors performed a piece of theatre from there play that is coming to Pegasus Theatre soon. The girls loved getting involved singing two different versions of Jingle Bells and trying to play the kazoo.

Then we hot footed it across town where we (including the preschool mascot) came face to face with a bear,, a dodo, the white rabbit from Alice in Wonderland and some dinosaurs in the Natural History Museum. We didn't stay long for they were going to close the doors and reopen them later to those that had tickets.

Once the doors had shut we headed back across town to the Ashmolean. On the way we spotted an acrobat suspended from a big balloon (Heliosphere Act) and saw many people trying to touch the lady's hand. So I lifted our eldest up so that she could do the same. One of the men helping the artist called to us to see if she'd managed to touch her hand. I replied I was unsure as I couldn't quite see but she claims to have done so.

Another place to have changed in Oxford over the years is the Ashmolean Museum. I am sure that I visited when I was of school age but I was blown away by it and found it to be rather grander than it once was. In one of the sections we discovered Christmas decorations being made. We all had a go trying to decorate and make the stars but the girls soon decided that running around would be far more fun! So sadly we took the decision to take our attempts home and finish them there but not before we'd heard carol singing echoing throughout the museum from a choir.

Outside once again into the cool night air and I questioned one of the security people as to where the parade was taking place. They mentioned that we may still be able to catch a glimpse if we headed down one of the side roads. So off we ran and the sounds of the parade soon filled our ears. I lifted my eldest up to have a good view of the lanterns that had been created and we enjoyed every minute of it before it disappeared down another street.

As we headed for the bus to return home. We came across the parade again. Having tried earlier to capture some footage of them he tried again and this is what we videoed.

Needless to say that evening the girls slept really well. Perhaps visions of Christmas danced in their heads.

Do you celebrate the arrival of Christmas?