A Christmas Display

5 Responses to A Christmas Display

1. ERWIN says:

   March 1, 2015 at 7:26 PM

   wonderful,beautiful;are those noons plastic!!?

   Reply
2. Brian McIver says:

   March 1, 2015 at 8:56 PM

   I love the buildings & the figure carrying the 2 barrels. Is this the train that is being used by TSSD in there Great locomotive chase set? Are these Lemax figures?

   Reply
3. George Albany says:

   March 4, 2015 at 9:18 PM

   Great Stuff! I’ll try to make my response brief, but Xmas stuff gets me going. By way of explanation, on my mother’s side, I’m PA German, She grew up in Chester PA in a big ole twin house w/a formal parlor. Shortly after Xmas, her two dutchy grandmothers would close off the parlor (closing the pocket doors) and set up a Xmas wonderland that was closed off til Xmas morning. Doll house, barn yard, a whole collection of dolls and a beautiful collection of hand blown decorations on the tree. Also a set of electric trains. As this was during the depression, she was the most popular kid on the block; all the little boys came to play with her electric trains.

   Welp, the apple didn’t fall far from the tree. We live in an old farmhouse (in a mostly built up community) that goes back in part to the late 18th century. We have two living rooms and when the kids were little, I did the same thing as my great grandmothers, filled one room with Xmas trees, electric trains (my late uncle’s 1920’s vintage standard gauge Lionels), etc. etc., etc. There was not a flat surface in the first floor (including radiator covers) that was not covered with Xmas gardens, nativity sets, and the like.

   As an aside, my daughter is a dwarf, and for many years, we hosted the Liberty Bell Chapter of LPA (Little People of America) Xmas party at our home. The kids loved it. We also had the best Santa ever (I could go on all night about how wonderful this guy was — he was even born on Xmas).

   Sadly, as the kids have gotten older, my knees have gotten bad (making it much harder to go up to the third floor to get all the Xmas decs out) so we don’t do as much as we used to. Also, two young dogs who would steal things from the Xmas gardens (and eat the trains), so we do much less in the way of Xmas decs anymore.

   By the way, the guy with the barrels is Lemax, we have one just like him who goes with our Xmas by the Sea garden. He’s delivering beer to the tavern. If I ever get all the Xmas gardens set up again, I’ll send photos. Oh, also, years ago, we had cats who would steal the baby Jesus out of the manger in two nativity sets and hide him. We always expected a ransom note that would have begun with, “We’ve got your God….”

   Again, great Xmas photos.

   Reply
   • admin says:

     March 5, 2015 at 9:51 PM

     George
     We had a Christmas putz that we would put up every year. It would have a train with some Plasticville buildings. I would set my figures in it and do stories as my normal area of play was too cold. I had many fun times with it.

     Reply
     • George Albany says:

       March 6, 2015 at 6:48 PM

       Ah, a putz. Funny, with all my PA German heritage, I never learned that term (except for the Yiddish) until I was grown up. As a kid, I was given a bunch of the sparkly putz houses that I used to set up in my own Xmas garden under one of those horrible 1950’s aluminum Xmas trees along with the Barclay and Manoil figures.

       By the way, living where you do, did you have to worry about a visit from the Belschnickle? My mother’s grandmothers had her living in mortal fear of the old Bels to the point that she never told us about him until we were teens. I, on the other hand, had my children terrified of the Bels (can tell you a couple funny stories if you like). To this day, my daughter (now 21) and I e-mail one another around December 6, asking if either of us has seen the old goat.

       Reply

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