Holiday Express at the UT Gardens

Holiday Express is a 4,000-square-foot miniature railway stationed in the UT Gardens. The display is made up of a quarter-mile of track that weaves through a miniature landscape featuring twelve garden-scale model trains on ten different rail lines.

Thousands of lights illuminate the miniature landscape of rivers, waterfalls, and more than one hundred buildings decorated for the holidays, including elaborate, to-scale replicas of existing area architecture during the eras depicted.

A crackling fire and hot cocoa will help visitors warm up, relax, and enjoy the atmosphere.

The Holiday Express will be open through January 1. Admission is six dollars. It’s free for children 4 years old and younger.

Hours are noon to 8:00 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays and noon to 6:00 p.m. on Sundays through Christmas Day. From December 26-29 and on January 1, the hours will be noon to 6:00 p.m.

Children’s holiday crafts, family scavenger hunt, and visits with Santa are also available during Special Event Sundays, December 4 and 18.

For more information, please visit http://utgardens.tennessee.edu/.

Clarence Brown Theatre

The campus theater has two shows that will continue until December 18.

The classic tale of a life redeemed is celebrated in the annual performance of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol showing in the Clarence Brown Theatre.

It’s a Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play returns to the Carousel Theatre this year. Inspired by the classic American film, the play is performed as a 1940s live radio broadcast in front of a studio audience. Live and on the air, five actors perform the dozens of characters, produce the sound effects, and break for commercial.

Patrons who buy tickets to one of the holiday shows can bring their ticket to the box office for 25 percent off admission to the other holiday show.

For more information, please visit: http://www.clarencebrowntheatre.com/.

Frank H. McClung Museum

The McClung Museum on campus has collections of anthropology, archaeology, decorative arts, local history, and natural history. It is easy to spend hours wandering through the displays, learning about geology, history, art, and culture of Tennessee as well as places around the world.

Current exhibits include: Ancient Egypt: The Eternal Voice, Archaeology and Native Peoples of Tennessee, Windows to Heaven: Treasures from the Museum of Russian Icons, The Decorative Experience, Geology and Fossil History of Tennessee, Human Origins: Searching for our Fossil Ancestors, The Battle of Fort Sanders and Tennessee Freshwater Mussels.

The museum is free and open to the public. It will be closed December 24 and 25 and January 1.

For more information, visit: http://mcclungmuseum.utk.edu/.

UT Basketball

During the holidays, you can watch the Vols take on UNC Asheville (December 20), ETSU (December 23), The Citadel (December 29), Chattanooga (January 2), and Florida (January 7). Meanwhile, the Lady Vols will play Old Dominion (December 28), Chattanooga (January 3), and Georgia (January 5).

Admission for UT students is free, but tickets must be requested online.

For the complete schedule, please visit: http://www.utsports.com/.

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C O N T A C T :

Amy Blakely, (865-974-5034, amy.blakely@tennessee.edu)

Each two-hour to six-hour camp will explore a different garden topic and includes fun activities and take-home projects for children.

“At the UT Gardens, we believe that kids and gardening naturally go together, so we are excited to introduce a new series of summer camps and programs specifically designed to teach children about the wonders of the natural world,” said Emily Smith, education coordinator for UT Gardens. “Campers will get their hands dirty while learning about flowers, trees, worms and more.”

Campers are divided by age — Lil’ Gardeners (ages 4-5); Explorers (ages 6-12); and Grands & Me (ages 6-12, with a grandparent). Within each category, several camps are offered. Prices start at $15 for members and $20 for non-members.

Smith and UT Gardens also are launching a monthly series of educational programming for adults, families and children.

Please visit the UT Gardens website, for a complete schedule of upcoming programs and camps. To register, contact Emily Smith at 974-7151.

For information on all UT camps, check out the UT Summer Camp 2010 article at http://www.utk.edu/tntoday/2010/04/16/summer-camps-2010/.

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C O N T A C T :

Bridget Hardy (865-974-2225, bhardy4@utk.edu)

More than 30 workshops will be offered for everyone, from novice to advanced gardeners, covering a variety of gardening interests. Workshops with such titles as How to Make a Rain Barrel, Basic Landscape Design, Heirloom Veggies, Japanese Maples You Need to Know, and Butterfly Gardening will be led by regional gardening experts and included in the cost of admission.

Featured speaker, author and Ijams Nature Center Naturalist Stephen Lyn Bales will share tales from his first book, Natural Histories: Stories from the Tennessee Valley. Bales will “take” participants up and down the Valley to discover the natural wonder and beauty of the Carolina chickadee, wild turkey, opossum, whip-poor-will, cicada, bald eagle, sycamore, pawpaw and many more.

Live musical performances will be held on both days. On Saturday, Wild Blue Yonder will perform from 11:00 a.m. until 12:30 p.m.; Four Leaf Peat from 1 p.m. until 2:30 p.m.; and the Knoxville Area Dulcimer Club from 3 p.m. until 4:30 p.m. On Sunday, the Early Morning String Dusters will play from 12:30 p.m. to 2 p.m. and the Hector Qirko Band from 3 p.m. until 4:30 p.m.

Kids of all ages will be able to visit the insect zoo and explore the butterfly house. Other kids’ activities will include make-and-take crafts projects, face painting and sprinkler time on the half-hour.

The festival will also include a garden marketplace in which visitors can shop for arts, crafts, garden goods and specialty plants from 47 vendors, and snacks will be available on site for purchase.

Round out the day with a self-guided tour of the gardens and learn about some 4,000 annuals, perennials, herbs, tropicals, trees, shrubs, vegetables and ornamental grasses.

Advance tickets may be purchased for $5 from the following local business partners: Bearden Garden Center, Carpe Librum Bookseller, Ellenburg Nursery, Emery’s 5 & 10, Pope’s #2, Stanley’s Greenhouse, Sweet Pea Garden Gifts, Vagabondia, Emory Road Garden Center, Thress Nursery Garden, Pope’s Garden Center, Out of Eden Garden Center, Willow Ridge Garden Center, Ridge Greenhouse & Florist and Meadow View Greenhouses.

Tickets may also be purchased online at https://web.dii.utk.edu/agstore, click on the “Events” link. At the gate, tickets will be $6.00. Children under 12 will be admitted free. Tickets are good for one day only, and the event will be held rain or shine. All proceeds will benefit the UT Gardens.

Blooms Days, in its 7th year, is made possible through the generosity of the Friends of the UT Gardens, the Knoxville News-Sentinel, WBIR-TV, WNOX News Talk 100.3 FM, WUOT 91.9 FM and UT Federal Credit Union.

The UT Gardens is located just off Neyland Drive behind the UT College of Veterinary Medicine in Knoxville. Parking is available in lot 66. From I-40 take Exit 386B onto Hwy 129 (Alcoa Hwy toward the Airport). From Hwy 129 take exit for Hwy 158 (Neyland Drive). Turn left at end of exit ramp. Turn left onto Joe Johnson Drive, and right at next light onto Chapman Drive. Parking lot 66 is directly across from the entrance to the UT Gardens. For more information, please visit http://www.bloomsdays.utk.edu or view the complete schedule on the Blooms Days brochure.

The University of Tennessee Gardens located in Knoxville and Jackson are part of the UT Institute of Agriculture. Their mission is to foster appreciation, education and stewardship of plants through garden displays, collections, educational programs and research trials. Some 4,000 annuals, perennials, herbs, tropicals, trees, shrubs, vegetables and ornamental grasses are evaluated each year. Both gardens are Tennessee Certified Arboreta and American Conifer Society Reference Gardens. The gardens are open during all seasons and free to the public. For more information, visit http://utgardens.tennessee and http://west.tennessee.edu/ornamentals/.