Christmas Picture Post
Two of Us with Stockings
Originally uploaded by cheesecakenyc. Lots of new photos uploaded on my Flickr site. We start here with a cozy Christmas Eve shot, where the stockings were hung by the chimney with care, etc. Below the cut, view the rest of our New Jersey Christmas, including a traditional holiday carol concert and midnight mass as well as some extremely lurid decorations.
This Christmas concert actually took place a couple of weeks ago, but I'm just getting it posted now. cordelia_v is part of a really good church choir, and the program was an excellent balance between sophisticated performance pieces and jolly group sing-alongs. The climax of the show was everybody singing Silent Night by candle light.
On Christmas Eve, the decorations were simple and lovely.
At Cordelia's, there were lots of traditional decorations...and presents!
The neighborhood churches also offered living nativity scenes on both Saturday and Sunday nights. I think they had to alternate so the llama could work both gigs. I guess it's hard to get a camel in New Jersey.
Local holiday spirit began to show at the carol concert. This man had it right down to his pants.
We drove around on Saturday night looking at local decorations. There is a dentist in Clifton who is famed for blanketing every square foot of his sizable home/office compound with decorations. This image is just one of four in the series that begins here.
And lastly, there are the unforgettable images of Fountains of Wayne. This is the garden center from which the musical group took its name. The full set of photos begins here.
On the ground floor, there are ordinary sale racks of typical lights decorations for both indoor and outdoor use. Then you move into the Christmas tree department. Tree after tree follows, decorated in over-the-top styles with various themes. Each tree is available for purchase, pre-decorated, or you can pick up the individual ornaments from baskets around the trees. Emerson was a bit dazzled.
But the real action is upstairs, where hundreds of three-foot-high child mannequins enact scenes from popular entertainments, the Christmas story, or just general trends. The Sushi Santa scene was particularly bizarre, with a row knife-wielding tots behind the sushi counter, and a gang of equally juvenile Harley enthusiasts up front on the left.
These same uncanny toys act out scenes from TV shows such as Survivor and Dora the Explorer, Mr. & Mrs. Claus at the beach, and Santa among the caped superheroes from the comics. This year's big addition was a Pirates of the Caribbean theme -- a diorama based on a film based on a diorama. Johnny Depp did not look too bad portrayed as a little child, though.
See all 33 photos here.