Festival of Trees

The Indianapolis Historical Society is celebrating their Festival of Trees. They have 70 decorated trees throughout their building. They're sponsored by different nonprofits, companies, colleges, and families. It. Is. Awesome. Here are a few highlights.

I adore this robot ornament.

In their Stardust Cafe (excellent grilled cheese, BTW), they have a stunning tree.

See the garland?

This one celebrates comics.

And this one is from the Indiana State Teachers Association. We have a typewriter like the white one at work that we still use. If I could turn back ti-ime...

This one is made of books and called Santa's Library. They had a similar one last year, but this year is Bigger and Better.

I was fascinated by the use of Lunaria (silver dollar plant) both in the main portion of the tree and as its topper.

This one is done by my alma mater, Franklin College! The topper is the steeple from Old Main, one of the primary buildings on campus. The tree skirt was made of overlapping FC pendants.

This one is where I nearly lost my friend forever. They had mushroom stools for you to sit on so you could play different versions of Mario that were IN THE TREE. As I only had an Atari growing up, I wasn't nearly so enthralled. It's a cool tree though.

This one would have been in my top 3 if it didn't have the terrifying Santa face at the top. That Santa will kill you with his eyes. Ignoring that though, it's beautiful. The garland was made of slips of paper on which the store's customers had written what was special about an Indiana Christmas. (I saw one that said it was the snow on cornstalks, for real.) The ornaments were all vintage--tons of Shiny Brite.

I applauded this one's dedication to their theme. They're a restoration company, so their tree was Frozen and included metal pipe nestled in the boughs as decoration.

The atrium of the Historical Society has this gigantic clock hanging in it. Do you see what's at the 4?

I don't have designer trees at home. I prefer mine with its popsicle-sled ornaments I made as a kid and the ornaments Andrew and I have bought each year that we've been together. That being said, I loved walking through the Festival of Trees and seeing the beautiful things people had done (and the few fails). If you're in Indianapolis between now and December 30, I highly recommend a visit!

I wish you could click on all these to make them bigger. Sadly, when I uploaded them they all rotated oddly. I had to re-upload from a different source. Sorry about that.