Christmas Collections

Since we just moved here and figured out where at least some of our stuff is going to go, I couldn’t imagine moving it all to replace it with Christmas decorations this year. So for the most part I just put out things I could add to the already decorated shelves.

But then I realized that since the musical instruments on top of the speakers live in baskets now it wouldn’t be too hard to move them and put out my snowmen and Santas before my youngest niece came to visit.

I thought she would remember them fondly from all the Christmases she spent at our house but she looked at them with a critical eye and with a touch of scorn in her voice asked, “Do you collect Santas and snowmen?”  A tougher question than you might think. I certainly have a few and I display them together so they look like a collection but they are not something I actively search out in the way I search for kitchen ornaments, say. 

I was excited to find that little ladle at the end while Christmas shopping this year. Or gnomes and dala horses. I found the dala horse at World Market this year and the little gnome while shopping for Christmas presents in Lincoln Square.

The authentic Swedish dala horse that my youngest daughter gave me a few years ago and a small dala horse with a rider as well as another favorite gnome reside on the shelf above.