Friday Download, 11/22: Cider and cookie fests in Alexandria, a holiday market at Mosaic, and a family fall fair in Springfield

The weekend forecast and things to do, plus the week’s top Fairfax County headlines

(Ryan Bacic/The Machine)

The Friday Download is your guide to the week and weekend in Fairfax and around the area. Subscribe today to get the next one in your inbox and support The Machine’s work.

Happy Friday, all. There’s a chance of snow today — but not the full fun kind just yet.

Below are the week’s top local headlines, the forecast for the weekend and 14 ways to spend it around NoVA, from a Christmas concert at Tysons to the annual Alexandria Cider Festival.

You’ll also now find a bonus section with top ongoing holiday events (like regional parks’ holiday light festivals) as those pile up. I’ll keep it here through the season.

Local news I read this week

Criminal justice and public safety 🚓

• Man who bragged on video about killing friend sentenced to life in prison (NBC4)

• Man charged with rape on W&OD Trail in Herndon (FFXnow)

Education 📖

• Fairfax school board renews superintendent’s contract, raises salary to $424K (WaPo)

• 8 NoVa school districts ask state to delay new school-performance framework (Northern Virginia Mag)

Government and politics 🏛️

• Fairfax’s Democratic supervisors seek a game plan for second Trump era (FFXnow)

• Vienna mayor to Fairfax supervisors: Make casino opposition top priority (Patch)

Housing and homelessness 🏠

• Fairfax County homebuyers paid 8% more per square foot on average in October than they did a year ago (FFXnow)

Sports 🏈

• Football coaches’ threat to boycott ends as Hayfield scores first playoff win (WUA9)

Transportation 🚍

• A Dulles beagle’s dream job: Sniffing food that shouldn’t be packed in luggage (WaPo)

• Metro to consider splitting Silver Line east of Stadium Armory (WJLA)

Weekend weather (from the National Weather Service)

• Friday: Cloudy and rainy, with a slight chance of (wet) snow in the afternoon. Highs in the lower 40s, lows in the upper 30s. 🌧️

• Saturday: Partly cloudy. Highs in the mid-50s, lows around 40. 🌤️

• Sunday: Partly cloudy. Highs in the mid-50s, lows in the mid-30s. 🌤️

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Things to do

• Enjoy a night of Christmas classics with Grammy winner Michael W. Smith at Capital One Hall in Tysons (Friday) 🎵

• Stop by the Great Falls Library for its fall book sale (Friday and Saturday) 📚

• See comedy by Sarah Silverman (Friday) or The Daily Show’s Michael Kosta (Saturday, two shows) at the Kennedy Center🎤

• For something totally different at the Kennedy Center, take your family for the coming-of-shark-age musical Finn (Saturday through Dec. 22) 🦈

• Spend an afternoon at the St. James’s Family Fall Fair in Springfield, with BBQ, live music and activities for kids (Saturday) 🍂

• Catch a holiday pop-up art gallery at Fairfax’s Sherwood Center (Saturday) 🎨

• Enjoy cider tastings, live music, craft vendors and games at the 2024 Alexandria Cider Festival (Saturday) … 🍎

• … and/or grab cookies from 30 different vendors at the annual Old Town Cookie Crawl (Saturday and Sunday, if you can get off the waitlist) 🍪

• For a nightcap, watch Alexandria’s tree-lighting ceremony as the city ends its yearlong 275th birthday celebration (Saturday) 🎄

• Eat a turkey leg and watch jousting at Shipgarten’s Renaissance Festival, in McLean (Saturday) 🍗

• Shop holiday markets at Mosaic District (Saturday and Sunday) or at Cascades Overlook Town Center or Ridgetop Coffee in Sterling (both Saturday) 🎁

Ongoing holiday events

• Take photos with Santa at the Fair Oaks Mall, Tysons Corner Center or Dulles Town Center through Dec. 24.

• Meadowlark Botanical Gardens’ Winter Walk of Lights (in Vienna), Bull Run Regional Park’s drive-through Festival of Lights (in Centreville) and Cameron Run Regional Park’s Winter Village (in Alexandria) are all operating through Jan. 5.

• Reston Town Center’s ice-skating rink is open through the end of January.

My plans

We’re catching up on Great British Bake-Off after a family dinner tonight, then catching up on life a bit Saturday.

The highlight, though, might be seeing Wicked on Sunday at Tysons. That is, as long as the other former theater kids in attendance can keep their magical voices to themselves.