Christmas Village - The Building

You think I'm kidding? The Building refers to the putting of the village together! I took a few shots of the process.


I started collecting Dept.56 Dickens Village Series buildings and accessories in 1991. Up until this house, I had plenty of room to put the village up every year. This house is smaller and is a challenge, however, if we sacrifice the entire dining room and eat meals on the lanai (pool porch) or on trays in the living room, there's plenty of space :)




I start with removing everything off of all the pieces of furniture I want to use. In this year's case it is the table, server and buffet. We stationed the table in the center but toward the window, I put on a lined, plastic tablecloth, large cardboard for protection, Christmas tablecloth and then we brought in the 4 x 8' sheet of plywood my husband built for me in the beginning.





Next comes the 1/2" piece of styrofoam, a correct-cut amount of batting (=snow) and I'm ready to build the train. The train is from the 1950/60's and still runs.

The holes you see in the stare to help run wires thru. Otherwise, they all have to make it to an edge, which is hard to do.










Then all the buildings are placed and wires run, connected and tested.







When it is all powered up the greenery and rest of the accessories are added. Here you can see the skating rink, town Christmas tree and street lights have been added.






Of course I forgot the batting this year until all the buildings were on and wired so husband Bob helped me correct the mistake!









Here you can see the buffet has activity on it.









This shows it before all the big greenery and trees were in. And the next blog will show the completed scenes with some close up.


Hope you had fun, I know its been a busy week for me!