Holiday Travels

With Thanksgiving only days away, the season of holiday travels is upon us. I hope that your holiday travels are smoother than Steve Martin and John Candy's in the classic Thanksgiving movie Planes, Trains, and Automobiles. (For fans of the movie, I'd like to pointout that the ChristmasAttic does carry pillows. "Pillows? Those aren't pillows!" Yes, fortunately, they are.) Holiday travel is always a little hectic, but usually worth the result. If it's not, perhaps a Christmas cruise is in order next year?

If you are lucky enough to be where you are going to stay for the holiday, then maybe you could include some foreign destinations in your home decorations:

Italy -- Nativities

Germany -- Handmade wooden angels

The United States -- Nutcrackers handmade in Virginia

Poland -- Blown-glass, hand-painted ornaments

Zimbabwe -- hand-painted tin ornaments

If you have the travel bug, collecting ornaments that represent all the exotic places you have been helps give your tree a personal touch. They also make fun conversation pieces for your holiday parties or dinners. When I was a child, some of theornaments on our family tree I liked most were those we found while traveling. My favorite were clothes-pins painted with bathing suits and snorkeling tubes commemorating our December trip to Jamaica one year.

Travel ornaments are a great way to incorporate places you have lived in your décor. I lived in Paris for a time, as anyone who sees my tree can tell.

I know that visiting Paris is not always feasible -- not that that stops me from bringing it up weekly to my husband -- but moving within the U.S. is common. Glasses, pillows, and dish towels are all inexpensive ways to keep your prior homes and all the memories you have of them part of the present day.

Just as you can bring the places you've traveled home and keep the past part of the present, you can send your friends and family around the country ornaments specific to Washington D.C. to remind them that they are in your thoughts. The most popular is the Official White House Historical Association 201o christmas ornament. Each year the ornament represents a different presidency, and this year it is McKinley's. (Okay, he's not one of the top 10, or 20, but it's still a pretty ornament.) You might also attach a holiday D.C. notecard to a gift you send this year, or tie this Santa-and-Rudolph-on-the-Capitol ornament onto your package's ribbon.

All Things Nutcracker

Nutcrackers have been a holiday favorite all over the world for hundreds of years. According to German folklore, the gift of a nutcracker brings luck to your family and protects your home. They are the "Watchmen" of a house. These days, nutcrackers appear in many forms. Santas, Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz, Ebenezer Scrooge, and even Shakespeare now appear in nutcracker form.

Making nutcrackers has long been an old world art, and collecting nutcrackers a holiday tradition. Nutcrackers also make wonderful symbolic gifts.

Nutcracker collections traditionally begin with a king. He must be displayed in a prominent location so that he can watch over his kingdom. The next piece to add should be a soldier, with a sword, lance, or pistol to protect the king. The third piece should represent good luck: in Europe traditionally a chimney-sweep is a standard lucky charm. Then comes a drummer or a prince. The drummer will drum out the good news of the kingdom, while a prince allows for the king to have an heir. Those who serve the king follow, including more soldiers to protect the king, a baker or a butcher to feed him, and some musicians to entertain him. From there your collection can grow simply as pieces inspire you. Enjoy collecting!

Germany is home to a long line of nutcrackers. Steinbach is one of the largest and oldest German nutcracker makers, and still operated by the Steinbach family. But nutcrackers also come from Virginia, where "The Nutcracker Man" Glenn Crider makes them by hand. We are happy to welcome Mr. Crider to the shop on November 14th, where he will be signing his creations.

Giving nutcrackers and adding to your own collection can be an annual holiday tradition. And if you like the nutcracker theme, a nutcracker ornament can be another way to take part in it. Christopher Radko and David Strand make blown-glass nutcracker ornaments,while the German pewter company Wilhelm Schweizer has translated the German nutcracker tradition into a hand-painted pewter ornament.

All of this talk of nutcrackers makes the dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy song play in my head. If a performance of Tchaikovsky’s ballet is what you are looking for, you have a few local performances to choose from this season. The Kennedy Center's production takes place November 24-28. The Warner Theatre offers a wider array of show times for the Washington Ballet's production, December 2-26. Tickets can be purchased online. As a memento for a child seeing The Nutcracker for the first time, we offer ornaments of the four main characters: Clara, the Nutcracker, Drosselmeyer, and the Mouse-King. The ballet is one of my favorite holiday traditions, as it is for many people. Looking around the shop at all of the nutcrackers, I think I understand what made Tchaikovsky choose to make one the hero of his story. There really is something magical about them.