Ornaments

I think the photo for the "Christmas season events in Catonsville" ( Catonsville Times, Nov. 30) is beautiful. I also enjoyed the article "Santa's arrival another grand occasion," ( Catonsville Times, Nov. 30), describing the community's welcoming Santa Claus at the 18th annual tree lighting. One major item is missing from both articles, which both mention ornaments made by students at Westowne Elementary School. Please give credit where credit is due. The students worked really hard on all of these ornaments.

Can I cut back ornamental grasses now? The foliage of ornamental grasses is usually enjoyed throughout winter. Traditionally, it is cut back just before new growth occurs in the spring. The exception would be miscanthus, which self-seeds, making it invasive (usually the seed-grown or early-flowering varieties.) Cut these seed heads off in fall. Any other grass whose seed is becoming a problem for you can also be cut back early to prevent self-sowing. Cutting huge old clumps of ornamental grass can be an onerous job. Some gardeners use a bungee cord to encircle the stems tightly, then cut them with a chain saw or electric hedge clippers.

If Oprah Winfrey singles out just 13 items as her "favorite things" of 2011, and one of them is yours, it's safe to assume you're going to quickly become very — very — popular. So now is probably not the best time to try to reach Sherry Kendall. Ever since Winfrey raved about Kendall's Christmas ornaments featuring hand-painted pet portraits in December's O, the Oprah Magazine, visits to the Woodbine artist's website have spiked, orders are piling up and the glass balls have appeared on two national TV shows.

I think the photo for the "Christmas season events in Catonsville" ( Catonsville Times, Nov. 30) is beautiful. I also enjoyed the article "Santa's arrival another grand occasion," ( Catonsville Times, Nov. 30), describing the community's welcoming Santa Claus at the 18th annual tree lighting. One major item is missing from both articles, which both mention ornaments made by students at Westowne Elementary School. Please give credit where credit is due. The students worked really hard on all of these ornaments.

EACH OF Dione Mahoney's Christmas ornaments conjures up memories when she takes them out of their protective wrapping each year, she says. That is not so unusual, until you hear about the transglobal adventures that some of those memories entail. Mahoney, a children's staff library associate at the branch in Savage, has been collecting Christmas ornaments from around the world for nearly 30 years. She usually hangs them on the family Christmas tree, but this year she is displaying them at the library instead.

Three young men were arrested and charged with stealing Christmas ornaments from the lawns of four houses in the Gamber area Wednesday morning.Brian R. Grimsley, 19, of the 7300 block of Springfield Ave.; Chad R. Clark, 19, of the 6000 block of Oakland Mills Road; and Christopher M. Flora, 18, of the 3400 block of Nottingham Road, were released on personal recognizance after their arrest about 1:15 a.m.State police said they received several calls about...

AS CHRISTMAS DRAWS near, it's easy to be caught up in the shopping, last-minute cooking and general frenzy that the holiday season can bring. It might be difficult to remember the magic of Christmases gone by, when, as a child, your only worry was deciding which present to open first on Christmas morning. But one Carroll County resident needs only to look around his home during the holiday season to be reminded of a calmer, more relaxed time when holiday decorating and celebrations were revered and treated as sacred family traditions.

The small town of Lauscha, deep in a fir tree forest in Germany's Thuringian mountains, is the birthplace of glass Christmas tree ornaments. Entire families have been making them there since the middle of the 19th century. F. W. Woolworth discovered these beautifully crafted ornaments in the 1890s on a toy-buying trip in Germany and ordered some for his original 5- and 10-cent store in Lancaster, Pa. They sold out immediately, and his subsequent orders expanded Lauscha's cottage industry and contributed to Woolworth's own success.

Some of the prettiest trees in Christmas shops this season are labeled Victorian. Decorated with lacy, beribboned confections in pastel colors, they are lovely to look at and reminiscent of holidays past. But such ornaments would never have appeared on a Victorian Christmas tree."They have a feminine, boudoir look," says Carolyn Flaherty, editor of Victorian Homes magazine. "Very romantic. But the Victorians were dignified. They never would have had them in their parlors."It's easy enough, though, to duplicate how the Victorians actually decorated -- without spending a lot of money.

Even if you have never collected annual Christmas tree ornaments, this may be the year you buy one. As the new millennium approaches, the desire to buy limited editions of many artifacts, including dated Christmas ornaments, is gaining momentum. People, realizing the significance of this once-in-a-lifetime event, are seeking souvenirs to mark it.Manufacturers know a good opportunity when they see one. They're rushing in with a fanciful array of ornaments. They're employing popular symbols, from the not-so-subtle ornaments with "2000" in numerals, to the expected icons of a new year, like mini-champagne glasses and champagne bottles ensconcedce buckets.

If Oprah Winfrey singles out just 13 items as her "favorite things" of 2011, and one of them is yours, it's safe to assume you're going to quickly become very — very — popular. So now is probably not the best time to try to reach Sherry Kendall. Ever since Winfrey raved about Kendall's Christmas ornaments featuring hand-painted pet portraits in December's O, the Oprah Magazine, visits to the Woodbine artist's website have spiked, orders are piling up and the glass balls have appeared on two national TV shows.

Upon entering the G. Krug & Son blacksmith shop, I was handed a pair of safety goggles and immediately knew I was in for a treat. All around me were the goings-on of a bygone era. Peter Krug, owner of the Baltimore workshop that has been in business since the early 19th century, crafts steel scrollwork by hand, the old-fashioned way: hammer and anvil shaping red-hot metal heated in a 2,500-degree forge. You don't know hot until you've stood in front of that forge on a summer day in a building that has no air conditioning.

Each of the past three years, James Ward of Westminster has sent 5,000 miniature Christmas trees to soldiers overseas, but this year he might have to leave thousands empty-handed. Ward said he has had trouble finding $25 donations for the 2-foot-tall trees that come complete with lights, ornaments and, most importantly, American soil. The foundation, Operation Christmas Tree, started after Ward sent a few dozen trees to his stepdaughter's unit in Iraq in 2006. When he found out how much the troops loved the trees, he decided to expand the operation to troops in countries around the world.

The gardener's never-ending search for color, even in the bleak months of fall and winter, has brought cabbage and kale out of the kitchen and into the garden. With the help of hybridizers, these peasant vegetables have been transformed into the colorful stars of late fall. Their blue-green outer leaves can enclose gem-like centers that run the rainbow from creamy white and yellow to deep red, touching on pink and lavender in between. Or their deeply cut and spiky foliage can look like something fanciful from a coral reef.

What is the best tool to use to cut down ornamental tall grass, such as porcupine grass or switch grass? Mine are 10 to 12 feet high. How low do I cut? When should I divide them? Cut your grass down in spring, leaving about a foot of stem. You can use manual or electric hedge clippers or even a chainsaw on a big stand of grass. Tying off above and below the cut with a bungee cord or rope helps stabilize the grass while you cut. Divide after cutting. (Porcupine grass is a type of miscanthus.

About four years ago, Jeanne Rowell decided she wanted to create a formal Christmas tree decorated entirely with Maryland-themed ornaments for the holiday showroom at Homestead Gardens. She visited various sites that sell ornaments throughout the region, and found that the selection of Maryland-themed decorations was slim. She said she decided that if she couldn't find ornaments to decorate the tree, she would design her own. "I already buy ornaments in Europe every year," she said. "And if you give the glass factories the designs, they will make anything that you want."

A bit of Anne Arundel County is on the national Christmas tree at the White House this year.Among the 3,500 ornaments on the 18 1/2 -foot tree are 10 decorations made by architecture students from Anne Arundel Community College. Julie DeStefano and Jerry Sowder, architecture students from Annapolis, designed and made by hand nine wooden hearts, painted gold, for the Fraser fir that stands in the White House Blue Room.Elizabeth Emerson, an architecture major from Fort Meade, crocheted a three-dimensional cotton snowflake.

About four years ago, Jeanne Rowell decided she wanted to create a formal Christmas tree decorated entirely with Maryland-themed ornaments for the holiday showroom at Homestead Gardens. She visited various sites that sell ornaments throughout the region, and found that the selection of Maryland-themed decorations was slim. She said she decided that if she couldn't find ornaments to decorate the tree, she would design her own. "I already buy ornaments in Europe every year," she said. "And if you give the glass factories the designs, they will make anything that you want."

Nick Hirsch swirled yellow and blue acrylic paint around inside a clear glass Christmas tree ball. The rich colors gleamed with a metallic sheen, still clearly yellow and blue in spots, while blending in others to a bright shade of green. When the 8-year-old Finksburg boy finished his craft, Susan Harry, a program specialist with the Westminster City Recreation and Parks, looped a piece of red ribbon through the ornament's cap, replaced it and helped him package the ball with blue tissue paper in a plastic bowl.