PORT ANGELES — The 34th annual Festival of Trees will open Wednesday night with the lighting of huge LED ornaments and renditions of “White Christmas” in English and S’Klallam.
The opening ceremonies will be at 5 p.m. outside the main entrance to the Vern Burton Community Center, 308 E. Fourth St., Port Angeles. The ceremonies, presented by the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe, will kick off the Olympic Medical Center Foundation’s holiday fundraiser, which will showcase 51 trees decorated by local designers Friday through Sunday at Vern Burton.
Peninsula Daily News will launch a contest at www. peninsuladailynews.com on Wednesday for a pair of tickets to the 2025 Festival of Trees. Register to win and vote for your favorite tree through Dec. 25.
The winner for the tickets will be announced Dec. 31.
The singing of “White Christmas” in S’Klallam will be an addition to the festival’s opening ceremonies. Loni Greninger, vice chair of the Jamestown S’Klallam Tribe, and her sister, Jaiden Bosick, performed it at the 2023 Teddy Bear Tea, and Bruce Skinner, executive director of the OMC Foundation, asked them to sing it for this year’s welcome to the festival.
“We’re really looking forward to this,” said Greninger, who will co-emcee the opening ceremonies with Skinner. “We’ve been practicing twice a week.”
Audiences will be treated to the lighting of four giant ornaments, accompanied by four renditions of “White Christmas.” Each musical performance will be by people within the lighted ornaments.
First up will be singer Amanda Bacon, followed by the Port Angeles Symphony Orchestra’s brass quintet. As the third ornament is lit, Greninger and Bosick, along with several other S’Klallam tribal members, will perform “White Christmas” in S’Klallam.
As the fourth ornament is lit, the S’Klallam singers — who also will include Mary Norton, Ann Tjemsland, Jesse Osmer, Justin Hill and Cathy MacGregor, perhaps with some others — will lead the audience in an English version of the popular Christmas carol.
In addition, opening ceremonies will include a performance by Ghostlight Productions.
A limited numbers of tickets, which are $20, will provide covered seating access to view the decorated trees before or after the ceremonies and a pre-event reception.
To buy tickets, as well as to purchase tickets for other festival events, go to the OMC Foundation website at www.omhf.org, call 360-417-7144 or go to the foundation office at 1015 Georgiana St., Port Angeles.
Tickets are still available for the Festival of Trees Teddy Bear Tea presented by Erika Ralston Word of Windermere on Saturday as well as the Gala presented by First Federal on Friday.
Tickets also are available for Friday’s Senior Breakfast, presented by Discovery Memory Care, and Family Days on Saturday and Sunday, presented by The Lodge at Sherwood Village, Sherwood Assisted living and Fifth Avenue Retirement Center.
Translation of “White Christmas” will be by Greninger, who noted that it can’t always be a direct translation of specific words, but rather is “concept to concept.”
For instance, the line “I’m dreaming of a white Christmas with every Christmas card I write,” becomes in S’Klallam, “I’m dreaming while I write.”
“We didn’t have Christmas cards,” Greninger said, “but the concept is there.”
Revitalization of the S’Klallam language has been in progress since the 1990s, when the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe took the lead after receiving a federal grant.
The Jamestown S’Klallam and Port Gamble S’Klallam tribes were invited to participate and all worked with Timothy Montler, who recorded vocabulary, grammar and stories from the elders.
The three tribes published a 900-page dictionary in 2012, Greninger said, as well as a companion grammar book in 2015.
“The S’Klallam language, like all other languages, has borrowed words and evolved words,” she said.
Borrowed words came from common trade languages between tribes, mostly Chinook Jargon and French influence. Evolved words are created over time, “because languages are living and evolving alongside the humans that speak them.”
“We can create words for what we didn’t have in the past,” Greninger said, citing the S’Klallam word for computer. It would translate to “box of knowledge.”
“We can also create words by keeping it as close to the English word as our language can allow,” she added, noting that some English sounds don’t exist in S’Klallam.
“S’Klallams did not have an equivalent word for Christmas, so we say “kuss-muss” or “keh-ss-muss,” she explained.
Children and adults in the three tribes are being taught the language either in formal schooling or more informal settings such as youth programs. Jamestown conducts a community language class on Monday nights for tribal families.
“We have elders in the class,” Greninger said. “It’s an opportunity for intergenerational learning.”
When a person learns another language, it can open up the possibility of thinking thoughts or feeling emotions not possible before.
“I can communicate more depth and feeling and connection than I could in English,” Greninger said.
As an example, there’s a phrase said by an adult to a child that translates to “you are my very breath.” In using the phrase, phonetically “aw-n-swee,” the speaker acknowledges that the youth “are your future … so many layers of life,” Greninger said.
Opening ceremonies
• 4 p.m. — Viewing and reception
• 5 p.m. — Opening ceremonies
• 5:30 p.m. – Viewing and receptions
Festival of Trees
• 5 p.m. Wednesday — Opening ceremonies.
• 8 a.m. Friday — Senior Breakfast, presented by Presented by Discovery Memory Care. Breakfast is served for all ages, entertainment and tree viewing. Event will feature a performance by the Stardust Band. Tickets are $16 each.
• 5 p.m. Friday — Festival of Trees Gala, with doors opening at 4:30 p.m. Presented by First Fed. Buffet dinner, tree auction and silent auction. Tickets $110 each.
• 9 a.m. and 11 a.m. Saturday — Teddy Bear Tea, presented by Erika Ralston Word of Windermere, for parents and children. Santa will make his first appearance at the event and will be available for photos with each child. Photos will be printed and available to pick up immediately following the event. Tickets are $15 each, $30 for VIP.
• 1:30 p.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday and 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Sunday — Family Days, presented by The Lodge at Sherwood Village, Sherwood Assisted Living and Fifth Avenue Retirement Center. Attendees will be able to view the trees, purchase raffle tickets, take photos with Santa and listen to entertainment. Tickets are $7 each, with children under 12 admitted free.
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Leah Leach is a former executive editor for Peninsula Daily News.
