Things to Do in Elkhorn This Weekend: Main Street & Balloons

Every August, the field near 204th and Dodge fills with color for a weekend, and half of west Omaha ends up looking at the sky. That's the visible event. The quieter one, a few miles east on Main Street, is a building that sat dark for two years finally turning its lights back on. If you live in Elkhorn, both are worth knowing about, but only one of them tells you something about where this town is actually headed.

A Century-Old Building Comes Back

The old Bella Vita space at 2620 Main Street closed in 2023 and stayed empty for more than two years, the kind of vacancy that makes a downtown block start to feel like it's waiting for something. The old Bella Vida building in downtown Elkhorn is being transformed into two new locally owned restaurants after sitting vacant for more than two years. Built in 1897, the building is being renovated by Chuck Olson, who also owns Main Street Cellar a block away.

Do the math and that building is 129 years old, older than the state highway system that eventually connected Elkhorn to the rest of the metro. Olson isn't treating it as a museum piece. The downstairs will house La Vida Nova, while upstairs a still-unnamed fine-dining restaurant will offer a chef's tasting menu, and each restaurant will have its own kitchen. Two restaurants, two kitchens, one Main Street address that had been sitting quiet since 2023.

Olson has said the point isn't novelty for its own sake. "It's keeping the small town feel that Elkhorn's always had and the families who have been big supporters of Elkhorn."

The timeline matters here too. Bella Vita Ristorante closed in 2023 at 2620 Main Street, and the main floor is becoming La Vida Nova, expected to open in May 2026, while the unnamed fine-dining concept upstairs was planned to open a few months later. If that second timeline held, the upstairs tasting-menu space should be opening its doors right around now, which means this August isn't just balloon season in Elkhorn. It's also the first real month with both floors of a 129-year-old building doing something again.

What This Weekend Actually Looks Like

The other headline event on the calendar is easier to plan around because it happens on a fixed schedule every year.

The Nebraska Balloon & Wine Festival takes place Friday, August 14, 2026, at 5:00 p.m. through Saturday, August 15 at 11:00 p.m., at the field north of 204th and Dodge in Elkhorn. The 20th annual festival features live music from Taxi Driver Amped Up on Friday and Love Town Band and High Heel on Saturday, along with a Kidzone and other entertainment. The wine showcase includes experts and wines from area wineries, with more than 60 to taste. Hot air balloons are set to launch around 7 p.m. with a balloon glow around 9 p.m., weather permitting. If you'd rather not fight for a parking spot near the field, the free park-and-ride shuttle running from Elkhorn High School to the festival entrance is back this year.

Twenty years is long enough that most residents under 30 have never known an August without it. That kind of consistency is its own kind of local knowledge. It tells you something about the town's appetite for showing up for itself, which is the same instinct that's now putting money into a Main Street building that had been sitting empty.

The Shops Have Their Own Calendar Too

Main Street's rhythm doesn't only run on festival weekends. The Shoppes of Olde Towne Elkhorn operate on their own recurring schedule, and it's a small detail that says a lot about how the district actually functions day to day. The owners of the shops that participate in Ladies Day Out events meet at 9 a.m. every second Tuesday of the month. That's not a marketing calendar built for tourists. It's a group of small business owners coordinating with each other on a standing schedule, which is a different kind of signal than a single ribbon-cutting.

If you're looking for where to sit outside on a warm evening while all of this plays out, local opinion keeps landing in the same place. "Best patio out west is easily Jukes Ale Works." It's not a fancy claim, and it doesn't need to be. A good patio in a town this size gets talked about by word of mouth long before it shows up on any list.

Two Festivals, Eleven Weeks Apart, One Pattern

Zoom out and a pattern starts to show up. Elkhorn Days ran May 28 through 31, 2026, with the area's largest parade, live music, vendor booths, cornhole, a beer garden, fireworks, and a car show. That was the spring anchor. Now, in August, the balloon festival hits its 20th year at the same time a building that had been dark since 2023 reopens on Main Street. None of these three things caused the others. But they're happening in the same eleven-week stretch, in the same small downtown corridor, and that's not nothing.

A town that only had the balloon festival would still be a fine place to live. A town that has the festival, a spring parade with its own following, and private capital willing to bet on a 129-year-old building two blocks away is a town where the civic calendar and the business calendar are moving in the same direction. That's the actual story this August. The balloons are the part everyone photographs. The empty storefront turning into two working kitchens is the part that tells you something you didn't already know.

What This Means If You Already Call Elkhorn Home

None of this requires a decision from you. You're not shopping for a neighborhood, you already live in one, and this is just what the next few weeks look like from where you're standing. Grab the shuttle from Elkhorn High School if you're heading to the festival Friday or Saturday and don't want to deal with parking. If you haven't been down to Main Street in a while, it's worth a drive past 2620 to see what's happening at the old Bella Vita address, whether that means dinner at La Vida Nova on the main floor or watching for the upstairs concept to finally put a name on its door. And if patio season still has a few good weeks left in it, Jukes Ale Works has apparently already made the case for itself.

None of this is a pitch to move here. It's just a snapshot of a town that's busier and more invested in its own Main Street than it was a year ago, written by someone who's paying attention to it either way. If you ever do find yourself thinking about buying or selling in Elkhorn, or anywhere else in the Omaha metro, Skyler Bauer is easy to reach and happy to talk through what your options actually look like. Schedule a showing or get a free home valuation whenever the timing makes sense for you.