One of the reasons we visit San Diego is to see my Aunt Marilyn and Uncle Fred who live in La Jolla, a few miles up the hill from here. Marilyn’s great Christmas joy is putting up her villages, her Department 56 collection. She has several hundred buildings, quite a few carriages and coaches, many people and all the various accoutrements which go along with this. She’s been putting up her villages for quite a many years now in just about every room in her home. She has cut down over the last few years, the 3-level village with a cantilevered section over her TV has become a one level village with no cantilever but she still puts up a good portion of her collection.
Construction her villages takes the better part of 2 months and she and Fred start in October. They have to set up the wooden stages for them, put all the lighting connections under these platforms, put the 'snow' around, place the buildings and insert all the lights in them and then place all the rest of the pieces around these. The lighting itself is a marvel since there are street lights and building lights and all the cords must snake around under the staging.
But, does she enjoy it? You bet she does - she must have some city planning genes in her. She leaves it up all through the Christmas season and only begins to take it down in early February. But the deconstruction takes as long as the construction but isn’t nearly as much fun. These last two years we have helped them and what a process it is.
I have always enjoyed seeing her villages but now I know how much effort and ingenuity it takes to put them all up. I now marvel at all the work and inventiveness it takes to get all of it together and how intricate the Department 56 creations are. We arrived at their home Wednesday afternoon in time to take all of the boxes for the buildings and other parts down from their storage cabinets in the garage before dinner. Thursday and Friday we will work to get all the villages put back into their boxes and into the garage. During this time, we actually stay at their home rather than coming back in the evenings to our RV.
Here’s a picture of one small corner of her villages. Note the number of pieces that she puts out.
Now, here’s the fun part - we get to spend some quality time with Marilyn and Fred. We all work hard but we all enjoy talking over breakfast, lunch and dinner. Just visiting them for an evening or so isn’t the same - it’s too condensed. This way, we have 2 1/2 days with them, working and relaxing. And, boy do we ever work.
Fred puts all the people back into their boxes after Gary and I find them and take them to him with their boxes.
Marilyn is the mastermind and manages it all while also putting much of it away herself.
Gary finds many of the pieces and also helps to box them up.
Then Fred and Gary take all of the boxes out to the cabinets in the garage and store them for next year.
Me, I’m the journalist - I take pictures and write the story. No, as you might guess, I’m right there in the thick of things helping.
In the end, we are tired and I’m sure that Marilyn and Fred are exhausted. But, it’s all done and we all retire to our own homes to relax. We all have a great time together and accomplish a lot over the two days we are there.
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