Vintage Christmas Reindeer
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The Charms of Christmas Ephemera and the Changing Face of Santa Claus
By Maribeth Keane and Jessica Lewis — I grew up in a home without any antiques. As a small kid, I started decorating my parents’ home for Christmas. I don’t know what influenced me, perhaps being alone and living in a rural environment might have had something to do with it because I engaged in a lot of fantasy play. I made a lot of ornaments out of stuff that I had lying around, and I decorated using things that I found in the garden. Through the years, I became more interested in Christmas decorations and met a few...
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Vintage Christmas Ornaments, From Cardboard Dresdens to Silvered Kugels
By Maribeth Keane and Jessica Lewis — About 42 years ago, my wife, Darla, went to a very large white elephant sale and found a box of antique Christmas ornaments. She thought they were wonderful, so she bought them, and that’s been her passion ever since. Eventually, ornaments became my passion, too. We’ve been collecting for 42 years now. Our collection’s not the biggest or the best, but it’s very nice. We put up 23 antique feathered Christmas trees and they all have antique Christmas ornaments. For a long time, we were very...
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A Guide to Christmas Antiques and Vintage Christmas Decorations
By Eric Beeson — Ever wonder about that box of vintage Christmas decorations in the attic? From wooden nutcrackers to glass Christrmas tree ornaments to 1930’s Lionel model trains, this article can help you identify what vintage or antique Christmas items might be in that box. Your cherished decorations might be valuable, and even if not, you can sure have a whole lot of fun decorating with them! Christmas Trees: From Simple to Space Age Decorating the tree, like many modern Christmas traditions, was...
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A History of Dimestore Christmas Village Houses
By Theodore Althof — The following is a history of these wondrous little artifacts called cardboard Christmas village houses - a history devoted to establishing some way of categorizing them and putting them into chronological perspective. It's a tall chore, because these were small-change notions, not expensive nor considered serious enough to impart model numbers, cataloging, and so forth by those who made them. Even the cheapest 59-cent Christmas light sets had numbers collectors could refer to. Not so the...