At 9:30 on the morning of Saturday, December 5, the doors open at Broadneck High School on Green Holly Drive. More than 130 vendors set up inside, and the Broadneck Craft Bazaar usually draws over 2,000 shoppers. The bake sale, the raffle of donated vendor items and the cashless breakfast and lunch concessions all support the school's student-led clubs and organizations.
That bazaar is the biggest stop of Arnold's holiday season, and it shows how the whole season works. The peninsula has no downtown and no shopping district built around the holidays. Most of its gift sales are run by nonprofits and volunteers, so a mug, a wreath or a jar of hot sauce bought here pays for something on the Broadneck that someone is trying to keep going.
A season organized by who's hosting
Six dates in under four weeks. All but one are hosted by a local nonprofit or community group:
| Date | Stop | Host | Where the money goes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sat., Nov. 14 | Illuminate Annapolis festival, AACC | Independent festival organizer | Individual vendors |
| Sat., Nov. 28 | Goodies Sale | Historic Goshen Farm | Supporting the farm |
| Sun., Nov. 29 | Cape St. Claire Christmas Tree Lighting | Cape St. Claire community | A free community evening |
| Tue., Dec. 1 | Evergreen Wreath Workshop | Cape St. Claire Garden Club | Wreaths for the Cape and downtown Annapolis |
| Sat., Dec. 5 | 42nd Broadneck Craft Bazaar | Broadneck Athletic Boosters | Student clubs and organizations |
| Tue., Dec. 8 | Providence Pottery Holiday Sale | Providence of Maryland | Job training programs |
The Tuesday evenings matter as much as the Saturdays. Arnold's season doesn't fit into one big weekend. Smaller events are spread across the weeks after Thanksgiving, which makes them easy to add to a regular workweek.
November 14 at AACC is the one stop with an outside organizer
The season opens at Anne Arundel Community College. The Illuminate Annapolis Mind-Body-Spirit-Arts Festival runs Saturday, November 14, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. in the Schwartz Student Union on the Main Campus at 101 College Parkway. Admission and workshops are free. Vendors include energywork and bodywork practitioners, intuitive readers, crystals, essential oils, spa products, artisans, jewelry and gifts, and the event listing also mentions aura photography. The Patch event listing confirms the date, the Student Union location and free admission.
This is the only stop on the calendar run by an outside festival organizer, so your money goes straight to the individual vendors. It's still a free, all-day indoor market a few minutes from most Arnold driveways, held in the middle of November when the calendar is otherwise quiet.
The same campus has a ticketed option that weekend. AACC Theatre is staging Lanford Wilson's "Book of Days," directed by Sean Urbantke, at the Kauffman Theater in the Pascal Center for Performing Arts. The Sunday, November 15 matinee runs from 2:00 to 4:30 p.m. Tickets are $20 general admission, $15 for AACC faculty and staff, seniors and active military, and $5 for students with a valid ID. The college calendar also lists an evening performance on Friday, November 6 at 7:30 p.m. AACC's performance page says music and dance dates will be posted later.
If you'd rather shop at a nonprofit table that same Saturday, St. Martin's-in-the-Field Episcopal Church at 375 Benfield Road in Severna Park holds its Christmas Mart from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. on November 14. It offers handmade gifts, baked goods, warm food, home décor and a white-elephant sale. The church asks shoppers to bring a nonperishable food item for SPAN, and proceeds support its community and outreach projects.
Small Business Saturday happens at a farm
On November 28, the Saturday after Thanksgiving, Historic Goshen Farm and Educational Center holds a Goodies Sale. The farm described it in the October 2026 issue of The Caper, the Cape St. Claire community newsletter:
"We'll have merchandise, hot sauces, loofahs, gourds, and more, all perfect for gifting while supporting the Farm."
The farm is at 1420 Cape St. Claire Road. No start time was listed for the sale, and Goshen Farm's events page asks visitors to follow the farm's channels because dates can change. Check before you drive over.
The sale comes during the farm's biggest push in years. Beginning October 1, Goshen started raising money to build a covered pavilion for events, classes and community gatherings. The same newsletter page also lists a gift you can give without wrapping. Anyone who joins as a member now gets membership through all of 2027 at no extra cost, with discounts on classes and events and access to garden plots. A Goshen membership may be the most Broadneck present on this list. The farm is an official site in the National Park Service's Network to Freedom, and it runs entirely on volunteers.
The Cape lights its tree, then makes its own wreaths
The next evening, Sunday, November 29, Cape St. Claire holds its 8th Annual Christmas Tree Lighting. The lighting starts at 6 p.m., and Santa visits at the Gatehouse until 7:30 p.m. Nothing is for sale here. The event is on this calendar because it's the one free evening on the peninsula's holiday schedule that isn't built around a sale.
Two days later, on Tuesday, December 1, the Cape St. Claire Garden Club holds its Evergreen Wreath Workshop. Members and guests bring evergreen clippings from their own gardens and make six wreaths together. Two go on display in downtown Annapolis, and four go to the Cape Clubhouse and Guard Shack. The club invites members to bring a friend for the evening, and refreshments are served. To join in, the club lists [email protected] as its contact, and it posts meeting dates on its blog at capegardenclub.wordpress.com.
When you see those two wreaths downtown in December, they started as clippings from yards in Cape St. Claire.
December 5: the bazaar that pays for the clubs
The Broadneck Craft Bazaar is in its 42nd year, which makes it the oldest event on this calendar by a wide margin. It runs from 9:30 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the high school, 1265 Green Holly Drive. The organizers say they focus on small, locally owned businesses, and all 130-plus vendors sell handcrafted goods.
Here's how it fits the pattern. Vendors make money from what they sell, and the school side of the event, meaning the concessions, bake sale and raffle, raises money for Broadneck's student-led clubs and organizations. The concessions are fully cashless, so a card or phone covers breakfast and lunch. The 2026 page doesn't list an admission price. Questions go to [email protected].
December 8: pottery sold at a greenhouse
The season ends on a Tuesday evening at a nursery on Shore Acres Road. The Providence Pottery Holiday Sale runs Tuesday, December 8, from 5 to 8 p.m. at Providence Greenhouses, 370 Shore Acres Road.
That address is the one to put in your phone. The pottery studio itself is at 40 Church Road in Arnold, but the holiday sale is held at the greenhouses.
Both sites belong to Providence of Maryland, a nonprofit that serves adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities. In 2023, as Eye On Annapolis reported, the Arnold pottery studio was renamed Providence Pottery & Arts Studio and the horticulture program became Providence Greenhouses. Both support job training and employment. Providence says the studio has been a community resource for more than 40 years. It makes handmade functional pottery with regional themes and runs classes and paint-your-own-pottery events. Its regular line includes dishware, vases, soap dishes, seasonal décor, planters and candle votives, and its wheel-throwing and hand-building classes usually run in six-to-eight-week sessions. If you have someone on your list who'd like a class more than a vase, keep those sessions in mind.
The greenhouses grow native plants wholesale and open for seasonal retail sales. Providence says retail plant purchases are generally limited to its public sale events, so the December 8 evening is also one of the few chances to walk through the site as a shopper.
Where the dates bump into each other
- November 14 has the Illuminate festival at AACC from 10 to 5 and the St. Martin's Christmas Mart in Severna Park from 9 to 2. You can do both if you start at St. Martin's.
- November 28 and 29 put the Goshen Farm sale and the Cape tree lighting on back-to-back days a short drive apart on the peninsula.
- December 1 and December 8 are both Tuesdays. The wreath workshop and the pottery sale are evening events that fit after work.
- December 5 is the one date on this list where you'll want to plan around the crowd, since the bazaar usually draws more than 2,000 shoppers in under six hours.
If your PCS orders have you arriving or leaving during this stretch, or you're thinking about listing in the new year and want to know how December plays on the Broadneck, The PCS Home Team knows this calendar well. Make Your Move Easy — Schedule a Free Consultation, and we'll plan your timeline around the things that matter to you here, from the bazaar on December 5 on.
