On Friday, Dec. 4, at 7 p.m., house lights go down inside the Old Polo Town Hall at 117 N. Franklin Ave. The Polo Area Community Theatre opens "Last Stop Till Christmas / Christmas Day in the Morning," a pair of Christmas one-acts, on the night before the Polo Christmas Festival.
The festival is still a single Saturday, Dec. 5. The play runs for two weekends around it, and that's useful on Saturday night, when the festival's evening program and the theater's 7 p.m. curtain fall within minutes of each other.
Two One-Acts on Franklin Avenue
PACT bills the production as two short plays in one evening. In "Last Stop Till Christmas," a woman named Angela waits at a bus stop on Christmas Eve, singing. More people arrive with their own troubles, and she pulls out an ornament and promises that whoever puts it on the tree will get their wish. "Christmas Day in the Morning" is set at the Little Angels Home for Orphans. The home may not last another year, and a broken-down bus leaves a traveling evangelist, her entourage and one lonely traveler at the door.
The cast came from an open call. Auditions were held Oct. 10 at the Old Polo Town Hall and were open to anyone ages 5 to 105, according to The Radar Free Press. The full run, as listed on PACT's website:
| Date | Day | Curtain |
|---|---|---|
| Dec. 4 | Friday | 7 p.m. |
| Dec. 5 | Saturday, festival day | 7 p.m. |
| Dec. 6 | Sunday | 2 p.m. |
| Dec. 11 | Friday | 7 p.m. |
| Dec. 12 | Saturday | 2 p.m. |
Tickets are sold through the theater's site. Questions go to [email protected].
Saturday Morning Fits Inside One School
Most of the confirmed festival-day schedule happens before lunch, and nearly all of it is in one building, Centennial Elementary School at 308 S. Pleasant Ave. The Polo Christmas Festival Committee runs the Craft & Vendor Show there from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Here's how the morning stacks up:
- 9 to 11 a.m., Donuts with Santa in the Centennial cafeteria. Families get donuts, juice and coffee, visits and photos with Santa and Mrs. Claus, and a magician, according to Shaw Local's September announcement.
- 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., Craft & Vendor Show, with lunch and refreshments from the Polo FFA.
- 10:30 a.m. to noon, Christmas Festival Story/Crafts, on the Polo Public Library calendar.
Vendor spaces were $25 each, with applications due Nov. 13. For a sense of scale, last year's show drew more than 20 vendors selling handmade crafts, jewelry, seasonal décor, baked goods and homemade soaps, as Shaw Local reported in November 2025. The Polo Chamber of Commerce said this year's festival is expected to be "even bigger and better."
With three overlapping windows in one building, families with young children can be done by early afternoon. Donuts with Santa ends at 11 a.m. and the library's story and crafts hour starts at 10:30, so the morning works best if you start in the cafeteria.
The Evening Sign-Up, and the Overlap
The festival's Linktree page has a sign-up form for the Parade of Lights. Vehicles, side-by-sides, golf carts and bicycles are all welcome, and participants are asked to light up as much as they can. Vehicles line up at Polo High School at 6:15 p.m. and get a number on arrival. The parade starts at 6:45 p.m. and leads Santa to the tree lighting at Mason Street and Division Street. Anyone driving must be 16 or older with a valid driver's license.
Last year the parade brought Santa and Mrs. Claus to the 7 p.m. tree lighting at Paul's Park, at Mason Street and Division Avenue.
On Saturday, Dec. 5, PACT's curtain also goes up at 7 p.m. A household that rides in the parade or stands at the tree lighting can't also be seated on Franklin Avenue that night. The five-date run takes care of this. Friday the 4th works for anyone who wants the play before the festival. The Sunday matinee on the 6th and the second weekend, on Dec. 11 and 12, leave festival Saturday open for the parade.
The same Linktree page lists two more ways to take part, a Santa's Helpers Food Drive and 60/40 raffle tickets. Details for both are on the festival's Facebook page, PoloChristmasFestival. Last year the drive collected non-perishable food for the Polo Lifeline Food Pantry, with drop-off at the Polo Public Library from Nov. 1 through Nov. 29. Canned goods, peanut butter, cereal, pasta, flour, toilet paper and tissues were among the suggested items, according to Around P-Town.
What Filled the Afternoon in 2025
The 2025 festival, its seventh, filled the gap between the school-building morning and the evening parade with activities spread across town. Shaw Local's 2025 preview listed this program for Dec. 6, 2025:
- An 8:30 a.m. Reindeer Run hosted by the Polo Public Library
- Polo Historical Society Historic Trolley Tours, on the hour from noon to 3 p.m.
- A 2 p.m. Christmas Sing-Along at the Polo Area Community Theatre
- Activities hosted by local businesses from 4 to 7 p.m., including horse-drawn wagon rides, strolling magic, face painting and live music
- A Polo Lions Club dinner of Italian beef and hot dogs at the Polo Senior Center, with live music from Audience of One featuring harpist Linette Chamberlain
- A Winter Carnival at Crossroads Church from 5 to 6:30 p.m.
The 2025 vendor show also had a kids' craft station run by Pinecreek Christian Church and live music by Korey C. Pepper from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m.
That was last year's lineup, and the festival committee posts the current schedule on its Facebook page and Linktree. The theater was already a festival venue in 2025, when the sing-along was held there. In 2026 the Old Polo Town Hall has a full production running from the night before the festival to the following weekend.
"It's wonderful to see how much the festival has grown each year thanks to our amazing sponsors and participants," festival committee member Megan White told Shaw Local last year.
The Second Weekend on Franklin Avenue
When the festival tables are packed up, PACT still has two shows left: Friday, Dec. 11, at 7 p.m. and a 2 p.m. matinee on Saturday, Dec. 12. The next production follows quickly. Auditions for "Ramona Quimby," a set of vignettes about Ramona's third-grade year and her sister Beezus, are Dec. 19, 2026, a week after the Christmas plays close.
For the first weekend of December, the plan comes down to a few times. Donuts with Santa runs from 9 to 11 a.m. at Centennial. The vendor show runs until 1 p.m. Parade lineup at Polo High School is at 6:15 p.m. If you want to see the play and the parade, book the play for Friday, the Sunday matinee or Dec. 11 or 12.
Carla Benesh has worked in Polo and the rest of Ogle County for more than 32 years, and a December like this one is part of what she describes to buyers looking at these towns. If you own a home in Polo and want to know what it's worth before the new year, Carla Benesh can walk you through it after the festival. Request a Free Market Valuation.
