12/14/2012
My mom passed away December 13 last year, so this entry is about her part of Christmas decorating, which has grown to be a large part of our indoor display. Many years ago she was into ceramics. We have a couple of nativity scenes that she has made that get put out. One of them is white, and the other painted. The painted one she always laughed about as being the only nativity on earth where one of the wise men had a goiter. She thought the spot was an ear, so she didn't cut off the excess before painting.
Her portion of the decorating started to grow in 1989. In November of that year, my sister and I were in a school bus accident which killed a good friend of ours. Mom needed something to get her mind off of this, so one day she purchased a couple of Department 56 Snow Village buildings. This first year we ended up with 4 of them set up on one of our pieces of furniture. This collection grew tremendously over time. At least one, and most of the time several new pieces were added each year. It grew to fill all of the furniture in one room of the house, the hearth (on two levels thanks to a couple of old crocks and a board), and the top of the piano, as well as a couple other places. Once we moved to SC, the collection took up most of the furniture in at least 3 different rooms. It grew so large that most years we would pick and choose pieces to display and pieces that would wait until the next year.
Last year the night before mom passed away, she was asleep in the hospital bed in the living room. She was surrounded by much of her Snow Village collection which we left on all night long. She passed at 11:40 on the morning of the 13th.
