The Shepherds - The Restoration.

Here is the set of Wisemen that Mom made for me.  I particularly love the little kneeler.  He has always been my favorite of all the figures that she made over the years.  As you will notice these are not nearly as elaborate as the set designed for the church.

But they remain a very special part of Christmas in our home each year.

                                                                The Shepherds

And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.

The Next two figures in the Dip and Drape set created in 1975 by my Mom are 2 Shepherds.

These two figures have always made me smile.  It is pretty obvious that they are not Kings, nor are they rich, nor are they regal.  Rather they are working men, they have a beautiful career watching sheep.  Their job requires them to be outside during the night, so their clothing must be heavier because nights in the dessert can be cool.  Some accounts say they lived with their sheep - so I'm quite sure they would have had long bushy beards.


Are you ready to smile?




Told you.....

That's okay Mom always smiled at them too - chuckled even.

So here they are, they are bright, they are warm and they are posed the way they are for a reason.

Originally they each held a sheep.  The purple Shepherd held a small lamb sort of between his hands and slightly over his shoulder.  The blue Shepherd held a much larger sheep.  The sheep were large plastic animal toys - remember from when children actually played farm -  but Mom had actually covered their bodies with sheepskin and they were very realistic.  They were missing from the group when it was returned to me.

I am still looking for toy sheep to replace the lost flock but in the meantime I decided that they could at least hold the Shepherds hooks, so I made a couple from wire.

There was not much to restore on these 2 figures, there was a bit of loose clothing so I re-glued some of the material.  I did darken their eyes somewhat but other than that these 2 are in original shape minus the sheep.

Actually none of the animals made it back with the set.  There were 2 ceramic camels , a really nice donkey and the 2 sheep - all missing.  

Also missing was the baby Jesus.  I have managed to find a Jesus replacement, but the animals are a more difficult find.  If anyone has any larger farm animals in their stash of old toys - I'm in need of sheep and a donkey...

Next post - Mary and Joseph...