Who can resist crafts with glitter to bedazzle your creations? The ultimate in glitter mania would be to re-create those cardboard villages that were sold in the five and ten cents stores in the late 40's and 50's. These glitter houses are often referred to as Putz-styled Christmas Villages. They were given this German name because the word "putzen" in one context means to decorate. Did you ever hear of someone "putzing" around? Sometimes the word means cleaning.
I did not discover this German connection and the Moravian church until I married my husband who grew up in Egg Harbor City, NJ. This church has a strong presence in the town because the founding fathers were of German heritage. The most prominent Moravian Church is in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. The Putz was used as a way to tell the story of the nativity to non-readers so the nativity scene was the primary focus originally but it evolved to include the quaint village scenes. I remember my mother-in-law asking my husband to go out and collect some moss for her village. This traditional practice of using moss and other natural enhancements would give the hills a natural look and cotton batting was used to make snow covered mountains. Some of lead figurines were 100 years old but others came from the 50's era including the skiers and the ice skaters that were placed on the pond. The pond was fashioned from a mirror or aluminum foil. The hand-made twig fence was handed down over the years. So I am sure many are not aware of this strong German influence of this custom of making village scenes. I still have the figurines and the fence but sadly the cardboard houses are no more. I do not remember what happened to them but I did get a collection of the Dickens Dept. 56 houses. But the glitter houses or the Putz houses are far more wondrous than those porcelain houses.
I was delighted to be invited to my sister's house as she hosted her co-workers from the South Jersey Health Care system for the second annual Christmas craft night. My sister has been creating the cardboard buildings for a few years now so to speed the assembly she precut the cardboard and painted the snow. The houses featured chimneys, dormers, some with corrugated roofs, clear plastic windows, and shutters. A free-form base had a hole to accommodate a battery operated tea light. They began to hot glue the houses and features together and my sister assured them that the glitter would hide all imperfections. Soon they were adhering the bottle brush trees near the foundations. At the end they were grouped together and the lights turned out to "oo-oos and aahhs"!
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