Get a jump on celebrating the arrival of 2024 with music, fairies or an icy dip

Molly Gilmore
·2 min read

Orchestra salutes ‘Star Wars’ and more

The Olympia Symphony Orchestra is celebrating New Year’s Eve with “More John Williams Movie Music,” including tunes from the Harry Potter and Indiana Jones films as well as “Star Wars” and “Jurassic Park.” Last year’s holiday tribute to Williams was a sell-out, so this time around, the orchestra is doing two performances, one at 3 p.m. and one at 7 p.m. The orchestra invites audience members to dress as their favorite characters — and be prepared to see some unusual characters on stage, too. Tickets for the concerts — which will be at The Washington Center for the Performing Arts, 512 Washington St. SE, Olympia — are $15.52-$76.27. After the later concert, the orchestra will host “It’s Midnight Somewhere,” an early NYE party, in the Washington Center’s adjacent Black Box; tickets are $45.

Happy Noon Year

It’s entirely possible that no one in this time zone celebrates the New Year as early as the Hands On Children’s Museum. The museum’s annual Noon Year’s Eve features a Times Square-style ball drop and bubble dance party every hour on the hour from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. Dec. 31. This year, the party doubles as a Winter Wonder Faire. (Yes, the folks at the museum at 414 Jefferson St. NE in Olympia are spelling it with an “E,” suggesting that it’s kind of a Renaissance Faire.) Young celebrants can make wands, wings and woodland crowns; skate in their socks; watch Dr. Science do his thing; and meet costumed fairies, including pirate fairies. Tickets are $3-$17.95, with babies younger than 18 months and museum members admitted free. Getting tickets or reservations online is recommended.

A Times Square-style ball drop, happening every hour on the hour, is just part of the festivities at the Hands On Children’s Museum’s Noon Year’s Eve.
A Times Square-style ball drop, happening every hour on the hour, is just part of the festivities at the Hands On Children’s Museum’s Noon Year’s Eve.

Feel the chill

Are you brave (or brrr-ave)? You could start 2024 with a jump into the chilly waters of Tenino’s Offut Lake. (Or maybe you, like the Olympian staff, think it would be kind of funny to watch other people do it.) The Lady of the Lake at Offut Lake Resort, 4005 120th Ave. SE, Tenino, is hosting a New Year’s Polar Plunge at 10 a.m. Monday, Jan. 1. The resort will be collecting donations for Bucoda Mayor and volunteer firefighter Rob Gordon, who has been diagnosed with inoperable cancer. There’ll be a lakeside bonfire, and the restaurant — open from 9 a.m. to noon — will serve biscuits and gravy, bloody marys and hot buttered rum.

Freelance writer Molly Gilmore has dared her husband to take the polar plunge. She talks about what’s happening in Olympia and beyond with 95.3 KGY-FM’s Michael Stein from 3 to 4 p.m. Fridays.