A lot of people feel very nostalgic at Christmas time, as they think back to their childhoods or back further to Victorian times. Modern life will never replace our fondness for the traditional Christmas village scene. These images can take many forms, including books, jigsaws, decorations and model villages.

A one thousand piece jigsaw will keep the family fully occupied over the festive season! Thomas Kinkade is one artist who designs these Christmas village puzzles, showing a typical winter scene of houses lit up with lights and horse drawn carriages. For collectors of old prints, there is a book that contains the Village Church Decorations Children Christmas from 1895. It shows a mother and her young daughter, dressed in their finest warm clothes and walking through a snowy churchyard.

Many people like to decorate the outside of their house and gardens with the brightest display of decorations. Rooftop ones are very popular, including the Santa Sleigh over the Village Outdoor Christmas Light. This is a rope light and shows Santa Claus led by three reindeer over a Christmas village scene of houses, church spire and tree tops coated in deep snow.

Little cottages and houses are another form of ornamental decoration at this special time of year. The Ginger Village - Deco Light Pretzel House is a charming cottage with a night light and is pink and purple. Lots of people collect decorative plates, displaying them in cabinets or hanging them on the wall. The Christmas Plate - Christmas in the Village shows a church and a duck pond with swans, bathed in blue moonlight. For those creatively inclined, Christmas Village stencils are fun to do, with pictures of children playing in the snow, sledging and horse carriages.

For an advent calendar with a difference, the Old Time Christmas Village Stickers calendar is ideal. Instead of opening windows each day, there are houses to stick on to winter scenes. The colorful calendar can be brought out every year, as the stickers can be re-used. Old fashioned houses surround a quaint village square with a Christmas tree in the middle. A church has a choir assembled outside and the snow topped hills form the background to this scene.

Model villages can be used indoors or outside. The Charles Dickens “A Christmas Carol” story is often the inspiration behind such models. This explains the Victorian theme of many village scenes. Snow is always on the ground, not so common now for today’s children, and the snow is pristine without the tracks of cars.

Many of us can recall as children getting bundled up in our winter coats, warmest gloves and long, knitted scarves, touring our neighborhoods singing Christmas carols with family and friends. It’s a tradition that’s been around since the night Jesus was born. It’s been said on that night, a choir of angels sang out in celebration.

A Christmas carol is a song or hymn whose lyrics are about Christmas or the winter season. They are traditionally sung in the period before and during Christmas. The tradition of Christmas carols hails back as far as the thirteenth century, although carols were originally communal songs sung during celebrations like harvest tide as well as Christmas. Christmas carols and caroling in the old world was a mix of singing and dancing and was practiced for all festivals throughout the year.  When Christmas was firmly established to be celebrated on December 25th, many of the existing songs were sung on that day and new ones written to celebrate Christmas.

St. Francis of Assisi was instrumental in making the Christmas celebration one for the people instead of just for the clergy.  He created large nativity scenes outside of his church and translated many of the Christmas carols from Latin into languages spoken by the average person and encouraged them to sing these songs to express their joy during the Christmas season. This practice of singing Christmas songs outside of the church near the nativity scenes spread throughout Europe and it was a natural next step for these Christmas carolers to start walking through the neighborhoods around the churches sharing their festive songs.

But why are they called carols instead of songs? A popular urban legend was that they were named after a little girl named Carol Poles who disappeared in 1888 in the Whitechaple district of London. According to the legend, the little girl was reported missing around Christmas and many people went searching for her at night. Due to fears concerning Jack the Ripper, the group would sing Christmas carols upon knocking in order to declare their good intentions.  And even in today’s changing world, caroling is a Christmas tradition many people still hold dear.