Hats the way to do an Oban Winter Festival

GET your thinking caps on to design your hats ready for this year’s Oban Winter Festival ... and to think how to surprise Santa with something special to make this year’s festival even more about the spirit of the season.

Last year’s theme was umbrellas and this year the shout has gone out to start making your hats for the grand finale parade.

To help inspiration rush to your head, bookings are now being taken for a hat workshop with Liz @ Heartfelt and the ladies from Mary’s Meals. This will be on Wednesday November 22 and space is limited, so sign up soon.

The theme of this year’s Christmas shop window competition is something old, something new, so you might want to take that theme and work it into your hats as well. It could be a fashion from days gone by or something futuristic.

And as for that special surprise for Santa? Why not take along a gift for him for a change?

At his winter woodland grotto at the Rockfield Centre, Oban, on November 24 and 25, Santa is inviting people to bring along a gift for the shoebox appeal to make Christmas special for those less fortunate in our area, working with Mary’s Meals and the Salvation Army. Please remember to write gender and age of recipient on the box.

This incredible festival, run by the community for the community, doesn’t just provide a wee bit of fun – it has grown to become a brand ambassador for the town and a significant contributor to the local economy.

Last year more than 20,000 people attended the 34 free events and three exhibitions which resulted in £22,000 being raised for charity and an economic impact for the town of £1.9 million with increasing numbers of visitors coming from elsewhere in the UK and around the world.

The programme for the festival is now at the printers, so get ready to get your copy soon.

Next week: we will be looking at the food events, markets and competitions we can all join in at Oban Winter Festival 2017.