Day of the Dead at The Domes

The Milwaukee Domes hosted a Day of the Dead event this year. It was a pretty cool experience, getting to see The Domes at night. There are three domes, each with a different climate and the plants that grow in each. There is a tropical dome with more rainforest type plants, a desert dome with cactus plants, and the show dome which has traditional flowers (for a Wisconsin spring or summer) and a gazebo.

I started with this photo because it's my favorite from that night. It's also my computer's wallpaper right now. This is a close-up of an altar/ofrenda. This is one of the warmer looking altars I think I've ever seen. So many candles, colors, and lush looking food. Note that kitty skeleton in the back.

But back to the beginning, here's what we saw on our walk up to The Domes. They were lit beautifully.

So, those are the three domes and here are some close-ups of the individual domes as they changed colors.

They look almost like spaceships to me.

The domes are made of glass and during the day they let in a lot of light.

I was surprised to receive a bag of candy on the way in! I'm going to assume this is all Mexican candy. All of it was new to me and so far it's different from what I'm used to. I tried one of the Mangomis (doesn't taste like much at first but gets really Mango flavored after a few minutes), one of the Mara Caramelos (a kind of bitter orange), and a strawberry candy I really liked. I can't see it in my pic so I must have eaten that before taking this photo.

We started in The Tropical Dome. That dome was very dark, and what light there was was an intense blue.

This frog is cool and little creepy under normal well-lit conditions. He was like some giant frog out of a scary movie in the dark. I'd guess his head is 2-3 ft wide.

"Coco's Ofrenda" was in this dome. There was a Coco theme overall. I still need to see that movie! I know enough about it to know why there's a little guitar on this altar, though.

Onto The Desert Dome! This dome had the most done with it. There were skeletons every which way. They seemed to fit with the desert theme. There are always a few (animal) skulls in this dome, even under normal circumstances.

A closer look at that big light above shows it to be the moon, as a giant lamp anyway. This really looked like a second moon from outside the dome!

These next few are going to be pretty dark, so I hope you can tell what's there. I think these skeletons look pretty cool in the shadows, so long as you can see them. 😉

We're getting into some scenes that inspired me to put together those porch displays for trick-or-treat night.

Yoga skeleton!

This is one light on a string of adorable skull lights.

Here are few more from another awesome string of lights. I'd love to have either one! I don't think I've ever seen sugar skull lights for sale.

How cute is this? These skeleton animals have been turning up so many places this year. I think they're perfect for Day of the Dead displays.

This was the side of an altar. I liked the way that plastic skull was glowing with the lights around it.

This is one of the few photos I used a flash on. I mostly liked the look of the skeletons by candlelight with no flash, but every now and then I wanted to see what was there fully.

I think this one got into my subconscious because I bought one of these very skulls at Target today and have it in my own little Day of the Dead display with some candles at this very moment!

Kissing skulls

Now we're back to that great altar in the first pic. There was all kinds of rope light action going on there.

Frida? I like the ghost candle in this one. I'm not sure what's going on here. Maybe the candle is reflected in the glass only partway?

She was hanging out next to the ofrenda. I like the way her face is half in the shadows.

A tombstone with paper flowers and candles:

Now we're in The Show Dome. I was able to get some photos of the lights twinkling all over the glass of the dome. And there's that gazebo I mentioned earlier.

Isn't that pretty? Here it is mid-change.

There were some random woodland creatures hidden in the plants. An orange squirrel?

And I don't know what this is. It sounds silly now, especially while I'm looking at this picture, but this scared me at the time! I guess because without using the flash it really blended in to the plants. So I think for a split second I thought there was really an animal on the ground.

As I mentioned earlier, there was a Coco theme to this event. So those of you who've seen the movie might recognize some of these characters. They were walking from dome to dome, singing.

This next one is a similar photo, except look at the guy in the red hoodie! Scary! I'm sure he was just moving his head quickly as I took my pic, but it's still scary.

There was a spooky sighting on the way home. Check out these plates! This car was a dark red, to boot! Now, "Devilln" could be a Cadillac thing. Like he's "Cadillac Devilln" or... The Devil? De Villain? Hmm... These are some cool plates to see around this time of year, anyway!