Country Christmas!

Country Christmas!

Cobblestone Farm Association schedules annual holiday festival

“Country Christmas at Cobblestone Farm” will be held the first two Sundays of December (the 3rd and 10th) from noon to 4 p.m.

The city-owned 1844 farmhouse will be decorated with traditional swags and arrangements of greens made by members of an Ann Arbor Y workshop led by Virginia Tobias, which specializes in Christmas decorations of the 1844-64 period.

Girl Scouts of Junior Troop No. 30 under the direction of Mary Ann Pierce and Kathy Schafer are making handmade ornaments for an authentic old-fashioned Christmas tree. They will also serve as guides during the festival.

Traditional Christmas music will be provided by Robert Malley and his all male singers.

Among the items to delight children will be Margaret Smith’s display of antique dolls and doll accessories including some recent additions to her collection.

Also on display will be a miniature snow-covered village, complete with illuminated street lights, houses and churches, alive with tiny figures of people and animals. The focus of interest is a mill-pond with a working mill wheel operating above it.

The village, which is being lent to the Cobblestone Farm Association for this event by Mrs. Edward C. Protz in honor of her parents, Mr. and Mrs. Robert Edwards, who began the village for her in 1922, is typical of “German Christmas gardens” made by many Ann Arbor families in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Families often added new figures or portions each Christmas.

If there is snow, children will also be able to take a sleigh ride around the farm in Versile Fraleigh’s red sleigh pulled by his big Belgian draft horses a-jingle with sleigh bells.

The Country Christmas Gift Shop will feature handmade Christmas gift items, stocking stuffers, household decorations and tree ornaments. A baked goods table will have homemade cakes, breads and cookies.

Children are admitted free of charge. Adults are asked to make a donation. Parking is available at Buhr Park behind the farm or at the Seventh Day Adventist Church across Packard Road.

NEWS PHOTO BY JACK STUBBS

HOLIDAY LOOMING — Erwina Rutledge of the Ann Arbor Handweavers' Guild works on a woolen stair-runner which members of the Guild are weaving for the hallway area of Hobblestone Farm. It is being made from discarded woolen garments and blankets gathered by members of the Cobblestone Farm Association washed and cut into narrow strips suitable for the loom. The loom, which was dis assembled, reassembled cleaned and scrubbed by Patricia Smith, right, is installed in the southwest bedroom of the Farm and the weaving process will be demonstrated at the upcoming Country Christmas festivities. Pauline Naylor, left, of the Association looks on.