For the Christmas Market stand today I'm adding wreaths. I love fresh greenery in December. We don't usually put up wreaths and I haven't had a chance yet to go out and cut the swags for our front door, but I did make a little felt penguin carrying a wreath as a stand-in.
Today's addition to the Christmas Market is a candle stand. Whether for gifts or seasonal decor, candles seem to be a common element in holiday shopping. To go along with the stand I found this cute cartoon picture of a candle that I colored and hung in my room.
When I was a kid a major part of the Christmas season was my church's Sunday School program where each class would sing a song or do a little skit or something. At the end of the program everyone got a candy cane and each kid was given a paper lunch sack with some fruit (usually an apple or two and an orange) and a handful of peanuts in the shell. I looked forward to that treat for weeks, so for me fruit is an important aspect of holiday celebration. With that in mind, today I'm adding a fruit stand to the Christmas Market. For an extra, I made some fruit themed bookmarks that I will probably put into books that I gift.
Today's stall in the Christmas Market is an ornament stand. I decided to decorate this stand with some glass beads.
You'll notice all of our market stalls so far have been green or red. The Sunday and Christmas Eve stalls are gold. Not only are they a different color, these stalls are also not selling anything. These are activities, putting emphasis on experiences and doing positive things in the world instead of just consumption. So today's stall is a caroling booth. You'll see little music stands all ready for any singers to come along.
Today we're adding a skate rental stand to our Christmas market. It seems like ice skating is something you might do on a weekend while doing some Christmas shopping. Making something skating themed seemed really complicated but I found this little Care Bear Cousin figurine that we've had for as long as I can remember.
Today's addition to the Christmas market is a jewelry stand, a mainstay of craft fairs and markets. I really struggled with an addition to this stand. I have plenty of ideas for jewelry but one of the goals with this year's countdown was to reduce clutter. I already have a fair amount of jewelry and a job where I can't wear it. It would be wasteful to make something I'm never going to wear. Instead, I went through my existing jewelry and found some earrings that I don't wear. I bent the posts into loops so they can be repurposed as pendants or maybe charms for a charm bracelet.
