Well, here it is the first day of winter - and I have mostly not finished my Christmas decorations.
As I mentioned last week our reenactment unit interprets a house at the local restoration village. The house was built in 1730, with expansions in 1740 and 1760 and again after our period. All of the other houses in the village are from the 1800s so this house is sort of lost as the employees and volunteers are dressed and trained in the wrong period for the house. So members of our unit volunteered to interpret it for this event.
We treat the event as if the owner of the house (in period ) and his wife are having a “small” gathering of friends between their holiday (the family was of Dutch background) of St. Nicholas Day and Christmas. When the event had been held between Christmas and New Year’s it was instead a large party for the X night of Christmas. X being the day it actually is - for example on December 26, Boxing day to us in period, it is the first night of Christmas and so on.
Some of our unit members greet people at the door and tell them about the house in modern terms - where it was, how it got here, etc. They also show the public the parlor which is on the side of the hall and the public is not admitted to. Then they send them into the kitchen for the party. The public is told that not everyone they meet knows anything past the same date in 1775.
In the kitchen some of our members play period music - especially that of Christmas - and others sing along. I interpret the kitchen - which has an older Dutch fireplace, a Dutch cabinet bed, and items out as if the children left them out after Sinterklaus visited them on St. Nicholas Eve.
They then go into the owner’s office which has a bed chamber to either side of it. My husband is back there, also as someone from the period, to quickly tell them what they are seeing and then to speak with the people, especially children.
We are rather popular with some people telling us they come back each year purposely to visit us.
This year’s evenings were Thursday through Sunday nights. Thursday night was COLD. It was also WINDY, with many gusts of 40-60 mph. The front door is a “Dutch door” - that it is the top and bottom operate separately. We use a piece of wood to keep the two pieces together, and leave it just beyond the point that it would latch closed. We could not do so Thursday night. The wind kept blowing the door open. We ended up latching it closed and listening for noise of possible visitors. We had perhaps 30 visitors through the house, including a chorus that was hired by the village to wander about and sing. After they sang, one of them asked if they could come in and we told them to, of course, and to warm up.
Friday night was a tiny bit warmer, but at least the wind was gone. We had more people, but not big crowds.
Overnight Friday to Saturday it snowed about 3-4 inches, following which it got warmer and it rained, so there was very little snow left by Saturday night. Husband and I started to change into our period clothing Saturday afternoon and he suggested that I call the village and check that the path to the house had been cleared. Good thing! The village had canceled the event for the night. We scrambled to call our members who were coming and let them know. Then we went out for dinner and a movie.
Sunday night the weather was pleasant. We had good sized crowds in the house - lots of people, but manageable in size. There have been years, especially when the event was between Christmas and New Years, when they have had over 1500 people come through in a night and we have ended up needing to have people form a line to get in. Altogether Sunday night was a satisfying evening for us and I hope for the public and the village.
So, not much was done last weekend while all this was going on.
Monday I got rid of the last of the stuff sitting around in the dining room. The stuff for our RV was stored outside in the RV. Room was found in our studio behind the kitchen for a large box with my stored plastic containers for food in it (some of which are also used for the RV in season) and another large box which is used when husband washes the pieces he weaves after they are finished.
I then decorated the kitchen, the dining room, the front hall, and part of the living room, including a small beaded tree I made years ago. This tree is stored decorated (glass dome over it) and loses some decorations - this year much more than normal. I also caught up on assorted email, mail, papers, etc. not done since Wednesday.
Tuesday night I brought up the pieces of our Christmas tree and assembled it and put the lights on it. I added the angel topper and two other angel ornaments. These 3 items were made by us and always go on first, with the two angel ornaments sitting on the front of the tree just below the angel topper. I also set up a small tree we set up in our studio (where it can be seen from the kitchen) as I split ornaments we have made between the two (as opposed to the ones we have purchased and put on the main tree) and I therefore work on both at the same time. That was exhausting enough.
I did something smart this year. Whenever I am going up and down - something goes on any trips which I have nothing else to carry. When I went down for each section of the main Christmas tree I would carry down something, such as an empty box from the Monday decorations (2 of those to go down - 9 sections of the tree plus stand, pole, skirt, etc.) or the box from the beaded tree I set up Monday or the box from the small tree in the studio. Each time I also took up a bag of lights and stopped to check the lights in the kitchen to make sure they worked. This gave me a chance to breathe before running back down to the basement for another heavy section of tree. It seemed to work. After the top and 4 of the remaining sections I stopped and assembled the studio tree to rest a bit from running up and down before bringing up the other 4 sections.
Today I started decorating the two trees in earnest. I finished one box of ornaments completely and most of the second of 4 boxes. As I go along there is less is each box as the boxes are packed to be opened in order (and each box is labeled where it falls in the order) so there are more smaller ornaments in the first two boxes as they are the fancy ones and the latter two hold less as they tend to have the larger ornaments to fill in - such as plain balls. Over the years I have started doing the tree in sections so I have some idea of the general area to put each ornament which helps when setting it up (and finding the ornaments to pack them when taking it down).
I am pretty sure the trees will be ready in time. Not sure if I will get up the last of the decorations - some fake roping over the dining room and rear living room windows - as I am not sure I can get to the rear living room windows due to the rearrangement for the weaving stuff.
I took out one of the hams we took bought in Pennsylvania at the end of October to defrost for Christmas Eve dinner - should have plenty of leftovers for Christmas Day and even beyond.
So - a Happy and Merry to all - or as we say in the 1700s - A good Christmastide.
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