Nostalgia Winter of Old

by Ruth Ann Kirkpatrick

Last winter and for the last six, I've put together this display for the community room of my senior apartments.

It's a walk down old days lane. The country store with a Ford Woodie and an old log flat bed truck with a mill on a hill with a waterwheel, among other things we remember, or not. The rancher and logger are pictures off the internet, sized down and glued together a couple to make them strong, they are paper. The cars are metal detailed collector pieces. There is a pond with river stone you can't see in the snow but it all came together for the fun of winter memories for us older folks.

There are a couple of dogs waiting for the rancher coming into the store, and it just feels like genuine homestead hospitality. There is a bear on an old tree conk, I think that is the right spelling, and the entire scene is put together on 3 dollar store frames raised with throw-a-way Styrofoam pieces, glued to the underside and a couple of strings from dollar tree taped to the glass underside. The mill is setting on clear plastic 16 oz glasses so the illumination is not hidden by a box. That's the cool of this display, illuminated softly. There is an old fashioned street lamp by the corner and it is battery lit.

The buildings are birdhouses and in this picture, the light inside the mill had dimmed, but it too was lit and the waterwheel is on the left, can't see it, but it has streams of cut kitchen plastic wrap to simulate water off the wheel. The tree branches are twigs and the added porch for wood is made of twigs legs and cardboard roof with snow and ice cycles dripping from glue gun stands. Up close this is a fun display. I came downstairs one night and someone added the large star to the backdrop. Seemed just right to all of us.

Safe, nothing touching anything but the glass, and the Styrofoam raises the whole display from any table it sits on. Cotton of course, and whatever you like to make the scene.

The lights are soft and it is illuminated so it's just lovely to sit and look at, maybe reminisce a bit with a glass of eggnog or whatever?

The pine trees are a dollar store wreath cut apart and twisted into tress.

Everybody loves it but we are in lockdown this year so I'll post it here for a fun moment.

Enjoy my friends. Ruth