St. Charles comes alive with socially distanced safe holiday event

South First Street plaza in St. Charles was host to a bevy of holiday events Saturday.

Families happily strolled along a trail of decorated Christmas trees on First Street, enjoying the winter sun during the Holiday Homecoming.

As with the Scarecrow Stroll, local businesses, organizations and individuals were able to purchase a tree and decorate it with their own theme.

With the Fox River as a backdrop families lined up to see Santa.

Oliver Frohling, 6, of Elgin was just one of many children to stop and have his photo safely made with Kriss Kringle.

Father Christmas safely greeted children of all ages from a socially distanced six feet behind a rope of tinsel and from his door.

Five-year-old Kayley Symn of St. Charles brought her Christmas list to give to Saint Nicholas before having her photo made. Symn was able to drop the list off in a specially made mailbox.

"After the Scarecrow Stroll, it gives us confidence in realizing we can adapt any one of our events to still give people some sort of normalcy of celebrating, but also fit into the guidelines that are given to us and still hit our mission of bringing people down here to patronize and discover our businesses," said Jenna Sawicki, executive director of the St. Charles Business Alliance.

"By the end of the pandemic, whenever that may be, we will know how to pivot on all of our events."