christmas village ideas.....UPDATED WITH PICS

DH and I just bought a christmas village (thanks to the 50% sale at fortunoff last year.. I went a little nuts).. Dept 56: the dickens one. AND my bf lisa got the city scenes one. The other night we were talking about how to display them.

I think Dh wants to build a tallish table (to prevent the dog we are dog sitting for a few months from eating it) and covering it with a pretty green floor length table cloth.. Beyond that.. I guess all I can think of is arranging the house in a circle. We have a little bit of sidewalk that I thought I would make into a town square and some birch trees. I don't want to spend much more money on it.. this year at least.. but I want it to look cute.

Does anyone have any pics of thier displays they would like to share? How do you do snow?

TIA

ETA: I finished the village and added pictures below.

Message edited 11/24/2007 10:34:57 PM.

Re: christmas village ideas.....

They sell 'snow' that is sort of like cotton ball quality. It makes the people always fall over, so you have to kind of rip a hole in it so they are standing on the table. Then they kinda appear to be about and inch tall and the snow is two inches tall. It is hard to play around with, but once done, looks great. My mom has the Dept 56 collection and she puts it under her tree.

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I use the snow and I wrap books in plain white wrapping paper to create layers within the display.

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hey bf trish.
my mom told me that we should use "bowls" and "boxes" to create mountains.

last time i checked, lower manhattan didnt have mountains, but oh well!

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Message edited 11/12/2007 7:38:01 PM.

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I have snowbabies and display them...I use books and/or the boxes the pieces come in to create height.
I use a piece of fabric and then sprinkle the snow dust over the whole thing when I'm done to create a snow effect.

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This is how I did it last year


I want to add some snow in but I don't want it all over the floor (my mom's gets messy). I did use one of the boxes to make the bank on a hill! This year I have a bigger table to work with, so we shall see what I come up with

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The pic is kind of blurry but you can get an idea. I use fake snow and the boxes everything comes in to make hills and give height. Michaels has some cheap trees and extras to throw in to give character. Please post a pic when you set it up

Re: christmas village ideas.....

The pic is kind of blurry but you can get an idea. I use fake snow and the boxes everything comes in to make hills and give height. Michaels has some cheap trees and extras to throw in to give character. Please post a pic when you set it up


Wow that is really nice!!!!!

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This picture is from 2 years ago. I wish I had taken a picture from last year it looked so much better. I also have since added a few more pieces.

Message edited 11/12/2007 9:28:28 PM.

Re: christmas village ideas.....

I have 1 Dept 56 village piece, 2 no-names that I got from family, and the Dept 56 ice skater.

Last year, I got a card table sized table, put a white sheet on it, different sized boxes for height, and then another white sheet over that. Then I put the pieces on each of the three boxes with the ice skating rink at the bottom on the table.

To hide the power cords, I just folded the sheet over them.

THIS year however, we have a bay window that will be perfect for this. I have a timer also so that I won't have to remember to turn them all on.

I'm so excited, I can't even tell you. I have to see if I have time to get on eBay and buy another piece. We're very particular about our Dept 56 pieces!

I love seeing pictures of your setups, please keep them coming if you have more!!

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This is ours from last year. We used cotton and fake snow, along with little fences, walkways, etc.. it really came out awesome.

Image Attachment(s):

Message edited 11/13/2007 8:29:19 AM.

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Message edited 1/30/2009 10:07:45 PM.

Re: christmas village ideas.....

Posted by DJJ914

This picture is from 2 years ago. I wish I had taken a picture from last year it looked so much better. I also have since added a few more pieces.

IMAGE

Re: christmas village ideas.....

Last year, we bought a snow blanket- it was fuzzy, but not so bumpy, so that the little people figurines could stand.
We stack the boxes the houses came in underneath the snow blanket, making hills.
We have the Simpsons Springfield collection, it's hysterical.
My parents do an amazing job, on top of the kitchen cabinets- I will have to post a pic- they do it the day after Thanksgiving.

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Well here it is!!!!! What do you think? The platform is kind of smallish but our house is so tiny so we had to make it work. We had 4 but this weekend my MIL got us 2 more for Christmas ( we celebrated this weekend because she lives in TN and we won't see her) so we squeezed them on.

Message edited 11/24/2007 10:34:05 PM.

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Re: christmas village ideas.....UPDATED WITH PICS

Re: christmas village ideas.....UPDATED WITH PICS

that's so cool! It reminds me of the village my Grandma used to put up.

Re: christmas village ideas.....UPDATED WITH PICS

I love it!

Re: christmas village ideas.....UPDATED WITH PICS

Love it!

PS Owe you a call!!

Re: christmas village ideas.....UPDATED WITH PICS

Nice! Now I can't wait to put my village up!

Re: christmas village ideas.....UPDATED WITH PICS

Looks awesome!

Re: christmas village ideas.....UPDATED WITH PICS

it looks great!! I haven't put up my village in years, but you guys have inspired me to tackle it this year!