History of my Christmas Village

It has been amazing to be home with my family! I love it! My favorite part was spending pretty much the whole weekend putting up Christmas decorations and laughing at my four-year-old nephew. He is hilarious. Yesterday we put up the village. We started the village when I was in high school because my mom wanted me to have a collection of some sort. Some of my siblings wanted in on the fun of making a village, so they got some houses of their own, which eventually required the use  of the entire front room to showcase our village houses.

At first, my village was just a random collection, but eventually my mom began buying me houses or people that represented something about me or my life that year, so we've kept that tradition. Almost every item in my village tells something about me or my life. I have about 25 "items" in my village now. I say items because not everything in my village is a house. This year I actually got three things to add to my village: a house to represent me moving into my grandma's basement, a teddybear shop because I collect teddy bears, and a train because I rode a train for the first time this year. I am super excited to have a train in my village now! It even blows smoke and has a whistle!

I loaded up my car yesterday and it is packed full of my village and other things I am taking back with me. I'm hoping to set up my village on Tuesday night, at least start setting it up anyway.

As I started setting up my mom's village, I thought about how much work it is every year to take down all the boxes, figure out how to display it, take all of the things out of their boxes, etc. and I wondered if we were crazy for even doing it. I started out doing it by myself, but then I decided to wait until others could help me because that is what has made having a village so meaningful. The time we spend doing it means the world to me. Not everyone helps set it up, but they still do something to add to it. Ryan every year has put random toys in the village and told me the story of how they came to be there. I will really miss that about not having my village at home. Each year it is a different story and I look forward to it.

There is more I can say, but this will have to do. I have family dinner to go to !!