Joy of Christmas

Archive for November, 2008

The annual Christmas parade in Monroe will be very special coming Sunday for second grader Hannah Demski.

Hannah is seven years old and goes to Central Elementary School in Erie.

She won a sponsored essay and this has given her the right to write with Santa Claus and his elves in Sunday’s Christmas parade.

In her letter to Santa Hannah had pledged to always behave and to donate some Barbie dolls to children who are sick and in the hospital.

True to her word, shortly after writing the letter Hannah donated her Barbie doll to a local department store that provides new Barbie dolls to children who are ill.

The survey in Germany, performed by the magazine Stern, shows that one in three Germans will spend less money this year on Christmas gifts than in previous years.

The numbers are an indicator that the financial crisis is hitting hard in Europe: Germans are considered frugal shoppers already.

On the other hand, a little bit over half of the Germans set it there will spend about the same amount of money or more than in 2007.

Taking the average of the poll most people will spend around 300 euro (around US$375).

Still, a good quarter of those surveyed said that they will spend hundred Euro or less.

Germany is considered the world’s third-biggest economy while numbers released last week show that Germany has slipped into a recession for the first time in five years.

Well, Santa is gone. Which is kind of a hard feat because Santa in this case is a 9 foot high statue. It disappeared Friday night.

With the Watts family out of town Friday night the 9 foot resin statue of Santa clause disappeared. When they report that the statue is missing a police officer of the Schaumburg Police Department reported that it seems then that strapped to the roof of the Jeep Cherokee.

It would take at least two people to lift the statue; it’s quite heavy and quite bulky. The statue is valued at at least $1000.

“He’s huge. He’s big around. He’s got a sack of toys on his back and he’s a big boy.

I’m just sad that someone stole Santa. Christmas isn’t about Santa Claus. It’s about love and family and Jesus’ birthday.”
– Mr. Watts

The family has been putting their Christmastide shouts for the plastic spheres. Neighborhood children have their picture taken with it.

You probably don’t know this nor would you guess it, but one of the hardest things for Santa Claus every year is buying clothes. It’s not like you can walk into just any store and say “give me a pair of red trousers and the hat to go with it.”

And those times that you do find a Santa Claus costume it’s usually one for kids whereas, as we all know, Santa Claus needs an adult Santa Claus costume. And to make things worse, searching for “adult Santa Claus suit” at times leads to places where Santa rather doesn’t go.

Fortunately for you and I – because who would want to see Santa Claus in a pair of jeans? – there’s a great place on the web to buy Santa suits: buycostumes.com.

There are well over 30 suits on buycostumes.com. Most of these are your traditional Santa Claus suits.

We did spot two rather odd ones: they’re blue! And unfortunately there was one “adult” costume. Nothing bad but it’s a theme you don’t easily associate with Christmas.

Now, as there aren’t a lot of Santa Clauses around the world, and so his clothes can’t be mass-produced, prices can get rather steep. But fortunately for Santa, who also feels t Yahe recession, there’s also an economy Santa suit.

That’s good too because some of these suits are really very pricey. I would go as far as saying expensive. I have the idea that a good number of them are aimed more at public appearances than one-off in-house appearances. And war is if your job is Santa Claus a good suit is a good investment.

Most costumes come with the basics with a lot of extras being available elsewhere on the site. There is for instance a Santa belly…

In all, and this really is the most important thing, the Santa suits are very convincing. They don’t look like cheap rip-offs which merely hint at what they’re supposed to be. If you have kids or work with them you’ll appreciate what I mean :-)

Now as for the actual quality of the suits I can’t say much. I’ve seen them on the website and haven’t tried them myself. That said, while researching the company I haven’t found any indication of malpractice: in fact, when you do find something written about buycostumes it’s in the positive. People tend to be very, very satisfied both with the product and the service.

As a specialty costume maker buycostumes also provides other costumes, such as Halloween costumes. Taking that into account, that buycostumes makes it money solely from specialty costumes, I feel comfortable reviewing the site in the positive.

One of the hardest questions yet also one of the most frequently asked here at Joy of Christmas is: does Santa Claus exist?

There is of course the “Yes, Virginia” argument as to the question of whether or not Santa Claus exists and historical, almost touristic routes along lines of folklore and figures which can be likened to Santa Claus but we here at Joy of Christmas go a simple step further and unequivocally say; does Santa Claus exist? … YES

Now of course the last thing you want to do, and this doubly so if you’re a kid looking to find a truthful answer to this question, is to take any fool’s word for it at face value. That’s what got you into this mess in the first place and is what has you doubting Santa Claus’ existence right now, isn’t it?

Well, our luxury of answering you with a loud and sound Yes, Santa Claus does exist comes from recorded, US government approved evidence.

Read that again: the question “does Santa Claus exist” can be answered with official records, admissible in court!

After extensive research Joy of Christmas has laid hands on no less than 4 US certified official documents which have recorded Santa’s existence!

You can read more in our Christmas directory in the entry Santa Claus.

Ed Holden, owner of Potters, a chain of popular garden centres in the Langley and south Surrey areas, began the Christmas transformation at his new 27,000-square-foot store at the corner of 192nd Street and 48th Avenue in September.

This store is now the largest Christmas store in Western Canada. It has become a destination for shoppers from all over Metro Vancouver.

The rest of the year its focus is 100-per-cent garden products and all the familiar horticultural components – sections devoted to trees, shrubs, perennials and annuals as well as areas featuring containers, tools, fertilizer and all the other gardening paraphernalia.

“By September, we’re done selling chrysanthemums, pansies and bulbs,” Holden says. “We’re already starting to convert the interior of the store over to Christmas. Certainly by early October the change is complete.”

To give the store the desired Christmas ambience, especially in areas with themed ornaments such as nutcrackers, collectibles, novelties and seasonally slanted gifts for sportsmen and fishermen, part of the mega-Potters store has been totally blacked out. This is also to protect products from being faded by direct sunlight.

Elsewhere there are life-size Santas, trumpet-blowing angels, bearded old-world Saint Nicks, stockings and candles on fireplaces, garlands and sashes, wreaths, holly boughs and myriad twinkling tree lights.

Holden does all his shopping for Christmas items in the middle of February, not, as you might imagine in Asia, but in California and Las Vegas.

“We leave just after Christmas every year. We start out in Mexico, where we buy a lot of pottery items. Then we work our way up into the U.S., and end up in Las Vegas where there is a really big Christmas item wholesaler.”

“It has been suggested that we should shop in Asia – we certainly buy enough to do that – but we have a great relationship with suppliers already and they help us to identify trends.”

Holden says the end of summer and fall are “nail-biting” times for garden centre owners.

“If the weather is great, people aren’t prepared to yank out all their geraniums and impatiens just because we’re ready to sell them chrysanthemums, bulbs and winter pansies.”

So it has become more and more tempting to make the switchover to Christmas earlier and earlier.

“By October, one in 50 customers, if that, come in for garden items. Everyone comes here for Christmas stuff,” he says.

Other garden centres that have also made a major switch from horticulture to Christmas include Art Knapps in Port Coquitlam and Gardenworks at Mandevilles in Burnaby.

Both stores have devoted hundreds of square feet of store space to Christmas giftware, everything from artificial trees and accessories to Christmas candles, bells and novelties.

At Art Knapps, Clare McLellan, seasonals manager, says this year they have decorated at least 50 trees in a variety of themes, each in a different colour scheme.

“We’re already seeing that the most popular colour this year is platinum, which is actually more a cross between silver and pewter.”

Art Knapps was one of the first garden centres in Metro Vancouver to see the potential in switching the store to Christmas items in fall when it pioneered the idea back in 1990.

Meanwhile at GardenWorks at Mandevilles, off Southeast Marine Drive, manager Roberta Wards says they begin the transformation immediately after the Thanksgiving weekend in mid-October.

The store’s entire bedding-plant greenhouse is turned over to Christmas trees, wreaths and green decorative foliage materials, while an area normally used for displaying garden tools, pots, birdbaths and flower seeds is transformed into about 30 areas, each with a specific Christmas theme: nutcrackers, snowmen, Santas, angels, nativity, elves, glass ornaments, retro-Christmas, teddybears and so on.

“Our main goal is to maintain sales, which in turn enables us to keep staff year-round, rather than having to lay people off,” says Ward.

This year the store’s hot display is a Sex and the City tree, a black tree decorated with pink ornaments and flashy bling.

Carol Boyce Nelson, the store’s gift buyer, says Fraser-fir scented products are also popular, especially potpourri and reed-diffusers.

“There’s also always demand for products with a woodland theme – twigs, feathers, birds and branches.”

Top colour schemes this year, she says, are apple green and silver-grey.

“We have the apple colours displayed with a silvery mercury and the silver-pewter theme with purple accessories.”

Novelty trees are fun, but there hasn’t been a decline in interest for traditional red and green Christmas colours, Boyce-Nelson says.

Come January, though, all the stores will make a quick switch back to seeds, soil and slug bait.

The Christmas spirit is alive here in Southwest Louisiana but many shoppers are watching their wallets due to recent downturns in the economy.

” It’s one of our concerns, the economy this year but so far we haven’t see anything yet,” said Jonathan Primeaux.

” I think they are being more cautious with their money, they’re not spending like they use to. We don’t know if there is going to be a hurricane next year and people are just trying to spend less and be prepared for items they need instead of things you want,” said Nancy Jordan.

” Going more with like clothes versus toys because we need them just by how the economy is,” said Elise Queenan.

Lake Charles residents are getting a head start on their christmas shopping but don’t let their bags fool you.

” Spending less since we had two new babies in the family,” said Queenan.

” Our families are planning to spend less this year. We just feel like we don’t need anything, we are just blessed to have our health,” said Jordan.

” I think everyone will cut back this year,” said Fran Bice.

” It’s going to impact some of the businesses but it won’t slow them down too much,” said Primeaux.

Even though shoppers are spending less this holiday season, these shoppers say they will spend more of their money to support local businesses.

” Helping our local people more than these big corporations. We are helping them by buying the stuff they have made,” said Queenan.

” Not only does it promote the local business and promote the economy here in town but also to get people out and get in the holiday spirit and promote and good cause,” said Ginger Webb.

Whether they spend more or less money this season, Christmas will always be a special holiday here in the lake area