Sunday, January 4, 2009

Nativity Set

I love my Nativity set which my mother (Louise Long) and my father (LeRoy Long) made for me in 1977. In the early 1970's, my sister and mother went to "Ceramics" where they painted "greenware" and had it fired in a kiln. My sister Jane and her husband Harry hand-painted theirs, but Mom just put a white glaze on hers. No offense to the Provost Nativity set, I LOVED the pure white. So, in 1977, Mother presented me with this set.
Dad made the manger out of barn wood which he found in their community--Lake Sherwood Estates---the barn, which was abandoned from an old farm, later burned down. I love the rustic nature and knowing that it came from a barn near their house. Also, I loved knowing this Nativity set was something which Mother and Dad created together---each with their own skills (if you knew my dad, you'd especially like the "star" light gerry-rigged together out of an assortment of wires and plugs).

As my children will attest, the Baby Jesus is not part of the scene until Christmas morning and the 3 Kings with their camels don't join the Manger scene until Epiphany. When the girls were little, I used to march the the Kings and camels around the family room, inching them closer and closer. This year, they are just on another piece of furniture.

One of the things I don't like about Christmas is all of the fan-fare is before Christmas in our culture. I am more of a purist, I guess, and prefer the 12 days of Christmas between Christmas and Epiphany as it is supposed to be.

1 comment:

Leah Morgan Korbel said...

My mother took a ceremics class in the 60s and made Mary, Joseph and Jesus. She also did it with plain white glaze. I grew up loving it and remember my mother and me making a stable out of a shoe box covered with bark. Years later, just after I got married, she found the rest of the set including beautiful angel, wise men, animals and shepherds. I don't remember where she found it but she gave it to us for our Christmases. All white. I love it.