When I was young I remember that little Christmas cardboard village houses were available from the local five and ten stores. My family had cardboard glitter houses but they weren't a special treasure of ours. Our nativity scene was very special and it was displayed prominently. When I married my husband with German heritage I was delighted by his mother's Christmas village and nativity scene set-up. She explained to me that the fence was hand-made by some long gone relative and that some of the lead figurines were about a hundred years old. This was amazing to me since my Italian heritage didn't even go back a hundred years. Year zero of our family's heritage only went back to the earliest years of the twentieth century as far as known history. The town where I live now has many descendants of German heritage. My husband's mother was German Catholic although some of his grandparents were of the Lutheran Religion. I have since read online that this custom of building this village/nativity scene is strongly tied to the Moravian religion which is also well-represented in the community. Search for "Moravian Nativity" and you might find some delightful Christmas scenes.
My mother-in-law had the cardboard houses and those wired brush-like trees which I confess that I may have discarded them. I did keep her fence and the very old lead figurines. When my husband was a kid she added skiers and ice skater figurines so those figurines are now about fifty years old. Around 1986, "Department 56", ceramic houses became very popular. My husband bought me the eight houses including the church, a covered bridge, and the horse and carriage of the Dicken's Village. It was probably around that time that we abandoned the cardboard houses and merged his mother's figurines and accessories with our Dicken's houses. Here are some shots that I took of this year's set-up.
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, 2012!
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