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Plants

Fantasy of Trees Lives Up to Name

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Ah, Christmas! Chestnuts roasting on an open fire, Jack Frost nipping at your nose, conventions in the Quad Cities.

OK, so a convention of fund-raising volunteers in Moline and Rock Island, Ill., and Davenport and Burlington, Iowa, wouldn’t seem to have much bearing on Christmas as observed in San Diego, but it does. Marsha Bouman, chairwoman of last week’s Fantasy of Trees extravaganza for Children’s Hospital, sojourned to the Quad Cities last March for a meeting of party planners from the 30 or so U.S. cities that annually play host to major fund-raising events centered on displays of elaborately decorated Christmas trees. Bouman brought back plenty of ideas for the third of these benefits to be given in San Diego, which kicked off Wednesday with a grand and glorious gala at the new Sheraton Grande Torrey Pines hotel.

The party was sponsored by the Children’s Hospital Auxiliary, which borrowed the concept of a public display and auction of extravagant and imaginative trees from similar events given by groups in Atlanta, Salt Lake City and a host of mid-size burgs. At Wednesday’s gala dinner and auction, Bouman said that some groups raise up to $500,000 for their charities, and that the Children’s Auxiliary hopes to eventually enjoy similar success in San Diego.

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Event spokeswoman Sue Stadler added that the group’s goal is to establish Fantasy of Trees as a citywide tradition.

“We want it to be like the Christmas tree festival in Salt Lake City, which is a lot smaller than San Diego but draws as many as 100,000 people,” she said.

The fantasy was one of those rare and happy events accurately described by its title. Over the course of four days, participants were invited to inspect the 27 trees and 28 wreaths at the gala, a festive breakfast, a formal Christmas tea and a Saturday breakfast with Santa on hand for the junior set. Proceeds from the four days exceeded $50,000 and were earmarked for child-abuse prevention, education and research at the hospital’s Center for Child Protection.

About 500 guests turned out for Wednesday’s black-tie dinner and auction, and divided their time between examining the trees and enjoying the commotion caused by a frenetic band of bell-ringing elfs that dashed periodically through the ballroom. In the middle of a week of hot, dry Santa Ana winds, entertainment chairwoman Trudy Snell set up a temporary ice skating rink just outside the ballroom’s broad foyer windows and dressed a pair of professional skaters in Victorian garb, which did nothing to hinder their complicated pirouettes. Some of the many women who wore furs in a salute to seasonal elegance looked ready to join the skaters.

The trees provoked comment (and, in the auction, drew bids as high as $3,500); most were decorated by professional designers, and were sponsored variously by individuals, corporations and auxiliary units.

A panel of judges gave the best-of-show award to a doll-decked tree called “All Dolled Up,” but the highest bid came in for designer Cynthia Lambert’s elegantly naturalistic “Flora and Fauna.” The second-highest bid, $3,400, was garnered by “Christmas with MOMA,” an austere “tree” constructed of white-painted wood cutouts by architects Michael and Janice Batter of Batter Kay Associates. The attraction of the stark wooden form was the collection of gifts that came with it, which included works by several recognized artists, airline tickets to and accommodations in New York, and a tour of the Museum of Modern Art.

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Marc Tarasuck’s fanciful “Baby Boomer Christmas” loaded an artificial pine with a collection of yuppie artifacts, while traditionalists took solace in the “Night Before Christmas” tree designed by Joseph Variey and Theresa French.

The new hotel took advantage of this first opportunity to show off its public spaces to a local crowd by serving a handsome dinner of chilled seafood, veal paillard and pastry horns. Not everyone was happy, however; many guests groused about the $8 parking fee that was collected at the entrance to the garage. “Where do they think this is, New York?” asked one guest.

Bobbi Jones co-chaired a committee that included Dianna Brody, Becky Heintzman, Bonnie Henderson, Jayme Bouman, Ellen Moir, Ann Zouvas, Diane Pruett, Barbara Ann Watson, Connie Gorman and Marcellitte Penhune.

SAN DIEGO--A rather drab and dreary form of fund raising called the “phantom ball” has been attempted here and in other cities in recent years. This sort of ball never takes place, but merely solicits non-participants to send in donations and spend the night at home.

The Phantom Ball given Saturday by the women’s auxiliary of the San Diego Hebrew Home, however, populated the Grand Ballroom of the Sheraton Harbor Island not with shadows but with 450 guests who seemed only too eager to dress up and head out for a big night on the town. This party took its name and theme from the current rave musical about romance under the Paris Opera House, although its tone seemed borrowed more from the Ziegfeld Follies. There seemed a great deal of merriment behind the feathered masks that were carried by many of the women.

During the cocktail reception, one of the three co-chairs, Bobbi Rossman, promised that, as the night progressed, the ballroom would seem transformed into “the Phantom’s opera house.” This dark mood never descended, although the major motifs used in the musical were borrowed for the dimly lit setting, including eerie half-masks projected on the walls, dramatic draperies suspended like backstage curtains and romantic sprays of red roses on the tables.

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The Wayne Foster Orchestra played the “Phantom” score throughout the reception, but switched to dance music at the beginning of the dinner and was never allowed retreat or respite; the committee installed an extra-large dance floor that turned out to be barely sufficient for this revved-up group.

The meal opened with an invocation offered by Rabbi Melvin Weinman and continued with les raviolis forestiere , roulade de boeuf fantom and mousse decorated with chocolate masks.

Co-chair Sheila Lipinksy said the event would net more than $135,000, most of which would be used in developing a plan to refurbish the nursing wings of the 54th Street Hebrew Home in San Diego; some funds were set aside to purchase a shuttle bus for the new Seacrest Village home in Encinitas.

The third co-chair, Rusti Weiss, said that the auxiliary had returned its attention to the San Diego home after devoting the past five of its annual galas (Saturday’s was the 10th) to meeting its $750,000 pledge to Seacrest Village.

The guest list included Alvin and Frances Cushman, Art and Jeannie Rivkin, Charles and Alberta Feurzig, Andrew and Allan Viterbi, Harold and Lee Lehrer, Helen Berlin, Bob and Lil Breitbard, Marvin and Lee Krichman, Harry and Pearl Rubens, David and Dottie Garfield, Lee and Ina Bartell, Richard and Harriett Levi and Edgar and Alecia Jacobs.

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