TIGNISH – Thinking of building a Christmas village? It takes a lot of time and material to get it right, Jim Cobham demonstrates. The Christmas village in his Church Street, Tignish, home measures more than 20 feet in length, and he imagines it will get even bigger.
Cobham, 53, assembled his first village two years ago. He had decided to build a village with a mountain scene, and bought a train set while on a short-term work project.
“That was all I came home with was that train, and I built around it.”
Cobham built a mountain out of paper mache and tunneled the train through it.
His village was small that first year but then came the Boxing Day sales that set him up for year two.
“That just drove me right up the wall waiting a whole year to put that together,” he grinned.
Besides the importance of Boxing Day sales, Cobham learned something else about that first village: if you’re going to build it, it should be on display. It is now the focal point of his living room. His television and fireplace are right in the corner where the two main wings of his display meet. A corner piece connects the wings.
A village such as this doesn’t just go up for Christmas. It takes Cobham two to three weeks to assemble everything. It’s ready by the third week of November and stays up until late January.
While his wife, Bernadette, enjoys the display, they both bemoan the mess that’s created while everything is being assembled.
The village has over 60 distinct buildings, roads, utility lines, dozens of people, scores of trees and a hockey rink. The rink could either help attract admirers or generate some good-natured ribbing. There’s a Canadiens logo at centre ice. Cobham also built a hockey rink for his brother-in-law, Peter Mangoes. Mangoes’ village now boasts a rink with a Maple Leafs logo. Both rinks are built to scale.
“I love putting it together,” Cobham said of his display. “I still look at it. I rearrange things. I rearranged a couple of things today.”
He has no room to display some pieces he recently purchased. That virtually guarantees his village scene will be even bigger next year.
