LATHROP – When the Lathrop City Council got together for their second meeting in November two weeks ago, they freed up their December schedule.

It was more of a formality than anything – the holiday season is typically the lightest time of the year for local municipalities, and the amount of work that needs to get done can often get squeezed into a single meeting so there’s really no sense in sacrificing a family vacation for it.

But that’s city business. When you get elected, you’re expected to show up at a whole lot more than just official city functions, and in that regard, December might be the busiest time of the year for local elected officials.

We’re talking school events and community events and the calendar that gets even busier at Christmas approaches.

It’s a pretty safe bet that when the City of Lathrop lines Fifth Street in two weeks for the annual Christmas Parade, you’ll see most – if not all – of the city’s local leaders maneuvering down the parade route in a vehicle of some kind.

Here are a few of the things that you can expect to top local lists in terms of popular Lathrop holiday events:

•Christmas for Kids – Not everything that you see on a day-to-day basis as an EMS member is rewarding. Some of it can be downright heartbreaking. So when the Lathrop-Manteca Firefighters Association Local 4317 came up with a plan 15 years ago to provide less fortunate children in the community with a Christmas they could call their own, it quickly became a favorite and a popular event to sponsor.

Families end up going home with a full Christmas dinner to cook on their own and each child get sex-specific present – some of whom actually walk away with brand-new bicyclces.

•Lights on the Farm – There are a handful of local homes that go all-out when it comes to Christmas lights. More and more are popping up each and every year, including one in Lathrop last year that used an LED board in the driveway to give a trip-induced show that was well worth the trip. And then there’s the Dell’Osso’s custom collection. More than 200 individual displays proclaim life on the farm, and the entire show is choreographed to music. You don’t get the chance to see something like this every day.