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Fishmas came to the hatchery once again for another successful Holiday Open House at Wolf Creek National Fish Hatchery! A steady stream of roughly fifty visitors enjoyed a free holiday fun-filled day with nature-themed crafts, make-and-take Christmas ornaments, pictures with Santa, nature/Christmas stories, refreshments, and giveaways. This event utilizes reduce, reuse, and recycle principles to craft unique holiday décor, creating a family-friendly and cost free avenue for making memories during the holiday season.
Many of the crafts and ornaments were made using cardboard, natural materials, scrap pieces of paper, ribbons, buttons, etc. Though examples are provided on what to make, we are always impressed to see the creativity of visitors and the ideas they come up with on their own. Each year the hatchery provides supplies to make the requested "favorites" including tree cookie ornaments, cardboard/newspaper snowmen, and owl pinecones while also adding new crafts for returning workshop-goers. The new crafts for this year's event included glass ornaments to be filled with materials of their choosing, dried orange slice and cinnamon stick ornaments, and cardboard fish, turtles, and gingerbread houses. Participants are encouraged to make an array of ornaments so they leave the workshop with several new additions to their Christmas tree. A couple from Cincinnati, OH informed hatchery staff that this was their third year attending the Holiday Open House and that they have a tree in their home dedicated to ornaments they've made at the hatchery!
We would like to give a special thanks to the Friends of Wolf Creek National Fish Hatchery, Inc. who partnered with us to provide apple cider, hot chocolate, cookies, basket giveaways, and a 10% discount in the gift shop for attendees and also to our wonderful volunteers that spent many hours decorating, making example crafts, helping with the event, and clean up! Without them, events like this would not be possible.
We are already marking our calendars for the 2025 Holiday Open House!
For more photos of this event, visit our Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/WolfCreekNFH
