Memories: The Santa Collection

 When we decorate for Christmas, the first thing that goes up is the Santa collection. I really don't remember when I seriously started collecting Santas, but it must have been at least 30 years ago. 

The first Santas were from craft fairs and bazars. Some were gifts, Many were purchased from Christmas shops, and some are from our travels. 

I have featured this collection before on my blog, but my readers inform me that they always look forward to the Santa collection appearing, so here we go.

When we remodeled our family room we made sure we had shelving to hold my pottery collection most of the year, but to display Santas in December. 

These wooden Santas were collected a long time ago at craft bazars.

Papier Mache Santas came mostly as gifts, many from Tom, to add to the collection. 

My Aunt Lois made the ceramic St Nicholas on the left. The Father Christmas in the center is ceramic with a delicate candle crown. I purchased it at a now long gone Christmas shop at a local nursery. 

I love these Nordic guys, the center one in a Sami costume, and the one on the left is a traditional Saint Nicholas. 

A gardener and a baker fit my style. 

Santas with animals and birds make me happy. The one on the left is a Swedish Yule Tomte, a farm gnome, here with his barn cat. 

The roly polys on the top shelf are papier mache antiques found in out of the way antique shops. The one like it that Tom grew up with sits under his sister's tree. The center one on the bottom shelf is actually a ceramic bell, a gift long ago from my mother. 

Some are old, some are new. When we had our shelving built, some of the new shelves didn't hold tall Santas. There was a little gift shop next door to the salon where I got my hair cut. Each December I would stop in to support the shop and look for a new short Santa. 

These big guys sit on the hearth. The one on the left was purchased in New Orleans, and is made out of a swamp cypress tree root, called a cypress knee. 

Special stuff here, left to right:. This guy in his long johns is from the farm country in New York state. We ere on our way across the state to Niagra Falls. Passing through a small farm town, we saw a craft fair set up in the city park. We stopped. I came away with this treasure carved from cotton weed bark.

The second one came from a small, back street wood carver shop in Rothenburg, Germany.

Third is Terry Claus, with his Canada goose, dressed in a rain slicker, appropriate for his origin on Whidbey Island. 

The fourth one's history is lost in time, but I like him too. 

This wooden Santa is also from Rothenburg, Germany, from the famous Christmas shop Kathe Wohlfahrt. Not hand carved like the other one, but still special with great memories of a fabulous trip across the pond. 

These beautifully dressed Santas are gifts either to myself or from friends we hosted on our annual field trip to Christmas shops. We miss not being able to go this year.

There are more, and more memories, but that will do for now.

As I take them out of the packing tubs each year I remember their stories and the people and places they remind me of.