WALTON’S GARDEN CENTER

WALTO O N S E N ON’S

Shop Walton’s today to create a sizzling home for the holidays! Christmas trees, decorations, grills and gifts for the indoors and out!

Wheth there

Whether you are shopping for yourself or others there is always something different at YogaMart. From prayer cloth to hot yoga mat to books and Zafu stop by soon for best selection. 6039 Oram (at Skillman) 214-534-4469 yogamartusa.com

Fleece

Free Grinch Pattern for the month of December at “FLEECE” your new local yarn shop right here in East Dallas. Knit this fun gift just in time for the holidays. Located in Medallion Center6464 E Northwest Hwy., Ste 330 214.238.3820 fleeceboutique.com

12 Days Of Christmas

The beloved carol “The 12 Days of Christmas” was first printed in England in 1780, but didn’t become the classic song we know today until 1909 in an arrangement by English composerFrederic Austin, who added the iconic “five golden rings.”

Over at the DALLAS ARBORETUM , they take the traditional tune to new heights. Want to see nine ladies dancing or seven swans swimming? The botanical garden sets up fanciful scenes with painstaking attention to detail, right down to the rhinestone-encrusted pears surrounding a rotating partridge.

Called “12 Days of Christmas at Night,” the event offers a rare chance to tour the arboretum after dark. The expansive gardens glow with the twinkle of more than 500,000 holiday lights, which are paired with classic carols for a festive holiday evening. Tickets are $12.

The historic DeGolyer House will be open on select nights, serving up robust meals like roast pork with raspberry chipotle sauce in a merry setting. The entire home is expertly decorated for the season, and this year will feature Claus Collection Santa Exhibit, a display dedicated to St. Nick in his many iterations. Dinners are $55 a person and reservations are a must by callingEmily Gavin at 214.515.6511. Tours of the home are available during normal garden hours.

—EMILY CHARRIER

LAKE HIGHLANDS’ BRIGHT NIGHTS

For many, the ritual lighting of an evergreen tree, ideally a ginormous one, marks the beginning of the holiday season. Until last year, Lake Highlands did not have a tree-lighting ceremony to call its own. THE LAKE HIGHLANDS

JUNIOR WOMEN’S LEAGUE’S

LIGHT UP LAKE HIGHLANDS changed that, launching a late-November family festival that includes the illumination of a 30-foot fir, performances from Lake Highlands High School choirs, Santa appearances and free food from In-N-Out Burger. The timing was perfect, following 2015’s distressing discontinuation of the Casa Linda Plaza tree-lighting extravaganza, which had been a decades-long White Rock-area tradition. This free event takes place at Lake Highlands North Recreation Center, 9940 White Rock Trail from 4-6 p.m. Sunday, Nov. 27. The lighting is at 5:50 p.m., but if you miss that, fret not — the fantastic flora glows each evening at 5:30 until 2 a.m. through mid-January.

An Even Bigger Tree

The biggest indoor Christmas tree in the country, perhaps? Look just outside our neighborhood, at GALLERIA DALLAS, I-635 and Dallas Parkway. The iconic North Dallas mall annually showcases a 95-foot, ornamentand light- laden faux fir encircled at its base by ice that becomes a wildly popular winter break destination. “Millions of guests each year visit the tree,” Galleria spokesperson Kelly Hunter says. Pomp aplenty accompanies the annual tree installation, in the form of famous, champion ice skaters and a stunt-skating Santa known as Missile Toes. Friday, Nov. 25 at noon marks the first lighting of this season’s tree, but the month of December presents ample opportunities intended to instill in spectators bounteous holiday cheer: Olympians Johnny Weir and skating champs Ricky Dornbush and Ryan Bradley perform Saturdays, Dec. 3, 10 and 17, respectively. All shows are free, begin at 6 p.m. and feature young local and regional athletes. Each production closes with the flashy back-flipping Missile Toes lighting the Galleria Dallas Christmas Tree with what promoters call “pyrotechnic flourish.”

12 Days of Christmas at Night

Nov. 9-Dec. 30, 6-9 p.m. (except Christmas Eve and Christmas) dallasarboretum.org

Musical Events Not To Miss

1 Home to the annual HAIR METAL HOLIDAY, The Bomb Factory is located at 2713 Canton St., but we honor the venue and the event, a throwback metal-music bash, because the proprietors, Clint and Whitney Barlow, reside in Lake Highlands. The duo is credited with bringing Deep Ellum’s Bomb Factory and Trees back to life. Hair Metal Holiday, featuring SLAUGHTER, Kix, King’s X, Lynch Mob with George Lynch of Dokken, BulletBoys, Tuff, Pretty Boy Floyd and Lillian Axe — is Dec. 10 at 3 p.m. Tickets start at $30.

Parade Into The Season

For the 44th year, RICHARDSON’S CHRISTMAS PARADE showcases bands and dance teams from Richardson ISD schools and benefits Network, a charity that helps lower-income families in the district. Floats and other acts travel north on Plano Road from Richardson Square to Apollo Road and end in the Huffhines Park lot. Festivities begin at 9 a.m., Saturday, Dec. 3. A tree-lighting ceremony and opening of Santa’s Village, which welcomes the public all month, follows the procession.

Holiday Home Tour

“The Lake Highlands Women’s League Home Tour absolutely kicks off the holidays for me,” says reader Karen Clardy, a faithful participant. The HOLIDAY IN THE HIGHLANDS HOME TOUR this year falls on Friday, Dec. 2. Ticketholders peek inside four architecturally attractive neighborhood homes, all decked out for the season: 10905 Cactus Ln., 10025 Estate Ln., 6807 Hyde Park Dr. and 9552 Highedge Dr. Tickets are available at lhwl.org. Proceeds support the LHWL scholarships for Lake Highlands High School students.

Lights From Great Heights

2 Christmas collides with pop rock when the White Rock area-rooted POLYPHONIC SPREE puts on its big show this month. The annual Holiday Extravaganza takes place Dec. 10 at 6 p.m. at the Majestic Theatre, 1925 Elm St. Visit theholidayextravaganza.com or call 214.670.3687 for details.

3 WORLD BEAT CONCERT DRUM SHOW brings rhythms from around the world, and it is free at Richland College. The Richland Percussion Group and Steel Band performs at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Dec. 8 at Fannin Hall.

Dallas neighborhoods go all aglow each holiday season, and packing into the family SUV for a tour de dazzling decor is a time-tested tradition, but what if you could enjoy a bird’s-eye look at all that illumination in one 30-minute ride? Lake Highlands couple Connie and Ken Pyatt followed their passion in the 1990s when they opened SKY HELICOPTERS; now they operate the heliport, at 2559 S. Jupiter, from where you can launch the perfect December date night. Holiday lights tours fly over some of Dallas’ most impressively ignited

4 THE LONE STAR CIRCUS marks its 10th year of bringing it’s festive holiday “La Fête” showcase of acrobats and aerialists, music and mimes. You’ll want to get there 45 minutes early to take in the pre-show with music, poetry and more. The show runs Dec. 27-Jan 1, during which showtimes vary by day. Tickets are $21-$27 and available at lonestarcircus.com neighborhoods — White Rock, Park Cities, North Dallas and the Galleria, Farmers Branch and Downtown Dallas. The 30-minute flight runs $375 for two people. Add a third for $59. And, when seeking the perfect gift for that aspiring pilot in your life, Sky offers a flight-simulator lesson/flight combo — for $159, receive 30 minutes of instruction followed by 30 minutes in-the-air practice in a controlled environment. Visit skyhelicopters.com for more information.

12 Houses Mark 12 Days Of Christmas

One Lake Highlands cul-de-sac is known for its 12 days of Christmas display, which for more than a decade has enchanted sightseers with maids a milking, dancers dancing, swans a swimming and all the rest. Visit throughout December at TIMBERHOLLOW CIRCLE in the Oak Highlands neighborhood.

Nutcrackers Tradition

The nutcracker has been a symbol of the Christmas season since they were first presented as gifts of luck and protection in Germany in the 15th century. The holiday ballet of the same name, however, didn’t become a holiday tradition until more recently. While it was first danced in St. Petersburg in 1892, it wasn’t until the San Francisco ballet debuted the show on Christmas Eve in 1944 that it became an American holiday tradition. Here in the neighborhood, the KATHY BURKS THEATRE OF PUPPETRY ARTS is also taking on Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s classic and spinning the tale with an age-old art form: puppets. This year will also be the 20th anniversary of the family friendly event being performed at the Dallas Children’s Theater Nov. 18 – Dec. 21. For deaf viewers, a special performance will also be held in sign language on Dec. 4 at 4:30 p.m. Both performances will be held at the Rosewood Center, 5938 Skillman. Get tickets and more info at dct.org.

Snow in Dallas, if it comes, usually doesn’t arrive until after Christmas, but in 2012 — by some meteorological magic — the city awoke on Dec. 25 to a wonderful white-flake blanketed world. In Lake Highlands, dozens of families, after tearing into presents, attending to various holiday traditions and church services, took advantage of a rare opportunity. Heading to our neighborhood’s highest peak, FLAG POLE HILL,toting cardboard, trashcan lids and boogie boards, snow deprived Texans took part in the pinnacle of snow-day ritual — that is, sledding down our slushy “mountain.” If you’re fortunate enough to see snow at all this winter, you are required to give this a try — we suggest helmets, especially for beginners.

Ride The Hills

Take one sled bursting at the seams with brightly wrapped presents, and add a light- and tinsel-bedazzled flat-