So, how y’all like? This is what our dining table looks like in the “Arizona room” this Christmas season. Pretty neat, huh? This is the Fontanini nativity set my brother Dave and his wife had been sending us for a dozen years or so after we got married, perched underneath the prettiest aluminum Christmas tree $17 will buy you at Big Lots. It’s really very cool – almost makes you think the Baby Jesus is being born in Switzerland or Finland, doesn’t it?

The Fontanini set has always been a fave in our house, and it was fun watching it grow every year as we’d get yet another piece for the set. It’s beautiful stuff. Not sure why they stopped coming – I guess after a while you can only have so many sheep, oxen, and camels; otherwise, it startes resembling the Cartwright Ranch instead of Bethlehem. You can go pretty crazy with these kinds of things if you want: you start with a manger and The Big Three (Jesus, Mary, Joseph), then expand to The Lesser Three (the Three Wise Men), then out to a whole cast of lesser characters and creatures (shepherd, The Little Drummy Boy, various farm animals). If you really wanted to go crazy, you can expand into pieces for a small city, including local well, buildings, post office, Greyhound bus station, and, of course, the obligatory Walgreens on ever corner. But we’re happy with things just the way they are.