25 Years Ago

In the summer of 2000, a friend of mine and I took up the new hobby of painting miniature plaster houses to create our own Christmas village. We thought that by Thanksgiving, we could have about five or six houses complete…yeah, 50 houses later, we were way over of our goal.

For the first few years, I gave some away, but then I saw others I liked and bought new ones. Today, of the plaster houses that I painted, I have 41. I have purchased a few that were already complete, that were totally different from what I had, like the observatory for stargazing, a large cathedral, and two different covered bridges.

I will share a few pictures of my favorites, plus the ski mountain I created out of Styrofoam, which includes the abominable snowman, Bumble from the Rudolph movie. If this interests you, I hope you enjoy it.

We will start off with the Christmas Ski Mountain, complete with skiers and snowboarding bears.

Some of the buildings I painted had details and character that made me smile.

Joe’s Burger Shack is shaped like a hamburger

This group of buildings reminds me of my dad, as he was a lawyer. Conveniently, the lawyer’s office is next door to the police station and across the street from City Hall.

Library, Fire Station, and Post Office are at the top of the hill above the Salvation Army toy drive

Out of view is the firetruck that I got on our trip to New York. There are several vehicles I picked up on our travels, like the NYFD fire truck, the San Francisco streetcar, and pickup trucks from the Coca-Cola store in Las Vegas.

Moose Lodge, complete with a pair of moose

There are several homes of various styles, along with shops such as department stores, a toy store, a clock shop, a candle store, and more. I have several styles of churches besides the large cathedral. A fun house to paint was the rock house, and up the hill from it, some children decorate a Christmas tree while others are having a snowball fight.

And of course, every Christmas town needs at least one gas station and one Christmas tree farm.

As we enjoy the fun and festiveness of the season, let us always remember that holidays can be very hard for some. So share an extra smile, a friendly hand, and lots of kindness.

CFFC: Holiday Colors

Cee reminds us to share our holiday colors. I do love all holidays…but Christmas is a favorite due to my love of unique Christmas ornaments. I love their colors, their shapes and their meanings. Christmas is a time where we celebrate the birth of Jesus, and so many of my ornaments and décor follow along that theme. Except for the village. I have a fifty plus piece village that goes up in November when the weather turns cold. While there are many Christmas components to it, this year we added more winter components as in a mountain and ski slope.

You can see the full village takes up two tables, well a desk and a table, plus the cathedral is on a shelf further over. The majority of these plaster buildings, I painted as a summer project in 2000 and a few others have been bought over the years. This year we expanded the “country” by adding the mountain and ski slope.

And of course any good snow covered mountain needs an abdominal snowman…thanks to the Rudolph character Bumble.

But I must close with sharing the beauty of a new addition. My daughter knows my love for angels and got me this beautiful piece. At night, it’s lights glow, making it even more beautiful.

So regardless of the holiday you may celebrate this time of year, I remind you to do it with love and kindness. Those aspects of any holiday make the memories last longer, creating smiles and kindness that can carry you for the rest of the year.

Always Be Kind

2021 Holiday Doors

Thursday Doors is a weekly feature, hosted by No facilities, allowing door lovers to come together to admire and share their favorite door photos from around the world. Feel free to join in on the fun by creating your own Thursday Doors post each week and then sharing your link in the comments below, anytime between 12:01 am Thursday morning and Saturday noon (North American eastern time).

His post this week of Ginger bread houses inspired me to show some favorite doors from the village I painted with a friend way back in 2000. We wanted to have a small village for Christmas but could not quit finding cute houses. So now 48 houses later, I have my village. The village gets put out every year. We won’t talk about the 10 I gave away as Christmas gifts. Wish I still had them. But alas it is what it is. The first pictures are a few of the ones I painted that have more interesting door features.

The next set of pictures are from a new village I started this year. These structures are only 3 inches high against those above that are 5 inches or higher. I call this little village the Candy Cane Village. They feature Mr. & Mrs. Claus and I did not make these. They are actually supposed to be ornaments, except for the Mr. & Mrs. They were my mom’s.

***The red sign says “Believe in the Magic of Christmas”***

If you enjoyed these, I will post more village pieces this weekend. Have a great end to your week and remember to always be kind. It shows the sweeter side of you.