November, 2016 Issue: The Christmas Times<sup><small>TM</small></sup>


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	Bible Story of Christmas	More Stories of Christmas
	Christmas Music	Craft Resources
	About Nativities	Christmas Musings
	Christmas Poems	Christmas Memories
	About Christmas Trees	About Christmas Decorations
	Recipes	Activity Ideas
	Advent Resources	Other Resources
	Christmas Movies	Christmas Books

Written by Paul and Shelia Race for Family Christmas Online^TM

The Christmas Times^TM, the Official E-Mail Newsletter of Family Christmas Online^TM and Affiliated Sites

This newsletter is for people who like celebrating holidays, especially Christmas. It is produced in conjunction with the following web sites.

Family Christmas Online^TM
Cardboard Christmas^TM
Old Christmas Tree Lights^TM

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In this Issue

In case you wonder if you've been missing newsletters, you haven't. It's been almost a year since our last newsletter. Site maintenance and life issues have kept us going and going and going. For most of the year, I felt like Alice when the Red Queen told her ". . . here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!"

In addition, about a hundred people have signed up since the last newsletter, so this may be the first one you've seen. In some cases, you may have accidentally used the signup page to ask a question and didn't realize you were signing up. No problem. Just use the unsubscribe link above.

Speaking of Alice, our newsletter missed Halloween, but here's something Alice fans might enjoy. I needed a "halloween costume" in a hurry last month, and couldn't find anything "costumey" except for the top hat I use when Christmas caroling. That and a scrap of paper got me something "close enough." I'm sure nobody knew who I was supposed to be - since apparently no one actually reads any more unless they have to. But it did the job.

Do you remember the song that goes "We Need a Little Christmas/Right this very minute"? Well this year, we need a lot of Christmas. Yesterday. I don't know how soon that will happen for the Race family, as we're just now moving into a "new" home - new to us, anyway. (A big feature for us is the bedroom on the main floor - some of you know what I'm talking about.)

From the outside it looks entirely different than our old house, so Christmas decorating will be different, too. The new house has a wraparound porch. Shelia and her sister folk artist Sonya Howard have already had fun decorating that for autumn - before we've even moved in. So I suspect Shelia to have some more fun decorating it for Christmas. I'll try to take photos of things as they progress.

In the meantime, we still have the concrete deer that came with the property (and which we've offered to several friends). Do we put a red nose on one this December? If they were caribou instead of imitation white-tails, I'd probably be more excited about the possibility.

I do have a kitchy blow-mold Santa (post-1988, marked "Empire, Tarboro NC.") that I trashpicked a couple of years ago. I liked him because he was SO kitchy. He's even starting to grow on Shelia. But I don't think he's a good fit for the deer couple - he's kitchy in a different way than they are.

I probably won't build one, but I do have a sleigh pattern that might look nice behind them. At the request of a reader, I reverse-engineered it from a photo of a friend's display. Nobody seems to know where the original plans came from, but it was such a nice design, I was glad to do it for her. I didn't specify sizes, since everyone would have a different need anyway, depending on what kind and size of reindeer or Santa they wanted to use with it. If you recognize its source, please let me know so I can contact them.

If you're interested in other "home-made" projects, like this one, we have a couple of suggestions near the bottom of the page.

If you've been following us for a while, you know that our most impressive outdoor decorating effort was always decorating our outdoor "garden" railroad for Christmas. This year there probably won't be any outdoor trains running for Christmas, certainly not on a permanent railroad. We did have one last run at the old house, in conjunction with a wedding and family get-together. The "Last Hurrah" article tells about that.

Last year, we mentioned how many of our authors' original stories have found their way to magazines and newspapers. This week we were contacted by a fellow who reads stories online, so there may be an online audio version of "Miranda's Christmas Visitor" soon.

It is fun to see how far a little grace and warmth can go. Like around the world. Literally!

Topics discussed in this update include:

The Last Hurrah! - A last, unexpected run on the New Boston and Donnels Creek railroad.
Cardboard Christmas House Reminder - Collectors, authors, designers, builders, and lovers of those little cardboard houses that encircled so many Christmas trees between 1928 and 1970 come together to share ideas, plans, questions, and photos.
Don't Wait too Long to Test your Train (or Order the One You Want) - Our first web site was about trains, and we still keep it up, so we get plenty of anxious e-mails every December from people who just figured out their train won't run this year.
Home-Made Plywood Outdoor Decoration Suggestions
Thanksgiving Then, and Then, and Now - Thanksgiving history and resources.
Make Your Giving Count - Maximize your giving this year by making sure you give to organizations that actually help real people with real needs.

The Last Hurrah!

After eight years of decorating our outdoor railroad for Christmas and having a big "open railroad" with popcorn, Christmas music, toy trains for the kids to run, and so on, our railroad has shut down, in preparation for the move. But when our daughter asked to have the rehearsal dinner for her wedding at the "old place," we weeded and cleaned off the tracks again, and brought some trains, buildings, and people back to set up one more time. Someone else called the big feed at our house "the last hurrah," but I include the railroad in that. Even without hundreds of lights in the little trees, it certainly held the attention of the youngsters who attended. Until the food was ready, that is.

A longer description of that event is here: https://familygardentrains.com/newbost/16_10_23/last_hurrah.htm

Cardboard Christmas House Reminder

If you love those little cardboard villages folks used to set up on the coffee table or around the tree between 1926 and 1970, they're still around. Not only are people collecting them, but they are building both replicas and new versions that are stunning in their creativity and beauty.

In 2011, I set up a discussion forum so my collector and builder friends could share photos, etc. For a time I thought I'd index the plans and suggestions for people just coming into the forum, but the site got out of my control in a hurry, with hundreds of photos, dozens of plans and tips, and so on.

My thanks to the folks who have been so active and creative. Because if the forum's progress and growth depended on me, it would still be where it was a year ago. In fact, I've been so tied up with behind-the-scenes maintenance that I haven't even been able to process new signups for about ten months. My apologies if you are one of the people in the queue. I hope to get going on that some time after Thanksgiving, but we'll see.

Click the following link to jump to the forum page and see what's happening in this newly reinvigorated hobby.

https://cardboardchristmas.com/forums/index.php

If you want to go to the BigIndoorTrains.com pages that spelled out the first few dozen projects, mostly designed by "glitterhouse" guru Howard Lamey, click the following link:

https://bigindoortrains.com/primer/glitterhouses/glitterhouses.htm

Lionel's 'Western Union' train set uses an engine type and color combination that was used all over the country until about 1910, which makes it an excellent match for many holiday villages. Click here to jump to the Big Train Store page where it is described.

Don't Wait Don't Wait too Long to Test your Train (or Order the One You Want)

Here's a tip or two from someone who supports two very large model train web sites:

If you have a train you plan to set around your tree, get it out and test it NOW.
If you don't have a train and want one, please don't wait too long to order the one you want.

Every year I get anxious e-mails from folks who find out last-minute that their family train isn't working this year or the train they had their eye on has become unavailable. And they want me to "save Christmas" for their family by telling them where to get their trains fixed or how to get a specific train in the next 24 hours. (I used to get frantic Christmas Eve phone calls, until I took my phone number off my web page.)

Each of the last three years, I have gotten so many e-mails about broken or unavailable Christmas trains, that I didn't get them all answered until about St. Patrick's day - a little late to save anybody's Christmas, wouldn't you agree?

By the way, Lionel has added a Victorian-era paint job to its old-timey set, which would make it a good match for many holiday villages. That's the train we show above, in case you wondered.

If a new train is in your future, here is a link to a section of our Trains-N-Towns newsletter (for BigIndoorTrains.com and BigChristmasTrains.com) that gives details on what was available early this week.

https://bigindoortrains.com/trains_n_towns/16_11_newsletter_indoor.htm#train_market

Home-Made Plywood Outdoor Decoration Suggestions

When a reader asked us to recreate the plans for one of 'Doc' Johnson's most popular displays, we couldn't resist the challenge. Click to go to the article.

"Doc" Johnson's Airplane Santa - In Smethport, Pennsylvania, a pharmacist and folk artist that they called "Doc" Johnson started painting outdoor displays for people, and it eventually turned into a large business. One of his outdoor displays of Santa, his sleigh, and his reindeer once graced the lawn in front of the National Christmas Tree.

Doc's most popular sets were either of Santa, sleigh, and reindeer or nativity sets. Many, especially among the latter, were works of art that, though looking a little dated today, are far more impressive than anything that has come out since.

In 2014, a fan of Doc's work asked if I could recreate the plans for a display that used to be in the family. How could I resist. To see the article and its plans, please click the link below.

https://familychristmasonline.com/decorating/outdoor_decorations/johnson_art/santa_plane/santa_plane.htm

To learn more about "Doc" Johnson's unique folk Christmas art career, click below:

https://www.familychristmasonline.com/memories/smethport/smethport_store.htm

Popular Mechanics^TM Christmas 'Project-a-Plans - Between 1960 and 1966, Popular Mechanics magazine hired some uncredited but clever artists and designers to come up with whimsical Christmas decorations that anyone with a few tools and a few dollars could put in their front yard. Every year, my blue-collar Dad would buy the magazine, laugh over the clever projects, count up the cost of plywood and paint, and spend the would-be project money on things like food and clothes for the family. But I can't help enjoying even that memory whenever I see one of those projects still in use.

Click the following link to see an article that links to the old magazines' plans and instructions.

https://familychristmasonline.com/decorating/outdoor_decorations/popular_mechanics/pop_mech_project_a_plans.htm

Thanksgiving Then, and Then, and Now

Harvest feasts are as old as civilization - probably older. But there are always people who question what the classic US harvest festival story was really about. Turns out it's about Puritans who survived a rough year having a harvest feast and the local Native Americans who heard the ruckus joining them with some venison to share.

If you'd like to learn a few things about this national holiday that you don't know, and maybe unlearn some things that "everybody knows" that aren't actually true, you might enjoy reading the Thanksgiving-related articles on our FamilyChristmasOnline.com site.

Please click the following link to see the article

http://www.familychristmasonline.com/other_holidays/thanksgiving/thanksgiving.htm

Make Your Giving Count

Here's one more reminder - fake charities like to hit people up at the end of the year when they're in a giving mood (and when they are thinking about tax deductions). There are many real people with real needs, and giving is a good thing, regardless of your faith or worldview. But giving money that could have helped people to scam artists isn't a good thing. I wasn't going to put this in until next newsletter, but I got a call from a fake policeman's charity organization last week and from a fake fireman's charity organization this week, so I figured I'd publish early.

Please click the following link to see the article.

https://familychristmasonline.com/musings/giving/making_giving_count.htm

Keep in Touch

Each month, we get more interest in this newsletter, in our Christmas sites, and in the Christmas traditions, ideas, and memories we discuss. We welcome your questions and comments as indicators of what we should be working on next (also, we always try to answer reader questions quickly). In addition, if you have any photos, tips, or articles you'd like to share with your fellow Christmas enthusiasts, please let us know.

Best Wishes!

As always, our hope is that we can continue helping you and your family (as Dickens said of Scrooge):

Honor Christmas in your heart, and
"try to keep it all the year."

In the meantime, please keep in touch, and let us know what you'd like to see added or changed.

May God grant you joy and wonder every season of this year,

Paul and Shelia Race

http://FamilyChristmasOnline.com

http://CardboardChristmas.com

http://OldChristmasTreeLights.com

Click the following link to view our December, 2015 newsletter:

http://familychristmasonline.com/fco_newsletter/15_12_c_times.htm

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