What do you do all year long at the North Pole?” alumni family children asked Mrs. Claus as she read stories to them throughout the afternoon at the fourth annual Alumni Association Winter Wonderland celebration on the afternoon of December 9 at Alumni House. Mrs. Claus (a.k.a. Dianne Duffin, director of development communications at the Alumni Association) responded that she helped Santa and the elves make toys throughout the year and also took care of the reindeer. “You have to ad lib a lot,” said Duffin, herself a grandmother of five, after her debut performance as Santa’s spouse. “Seeing the excitement in the kids’ eyes reminds you that the children are what it’s all about.”
More than 1,000 alumni and community families attended. Horse drawn carriages transported them among events that included stories read by Mrs. Claus, making a gingerbread house and cookies, holiday crafts, a choir performance by elementary school children from Brighton’s St. Columbkill School (with which the Lynch School works throughout the year), and a concert by children’s entertainer Johnny the “K.”
With Winter Wonderland the Office of Alumni Affairs offers “something different from athletic events” to the more than 60,000 alumni and their families who live in the Boston area, explains Jim Costa, senior associate director of the Alumni Association. The celebration brings a variety of alumni to Alumni House and introduces children to the University. “We put a lot of work into it,” Costa says, “but it’s something we really enjoy doing just to see the kids’ faces.”