Our entire company is located in our home kitchen and dining room. While we hire extra help during the Christmas buying season, the rest of the year is manned by just Hermina and her husband.  Production for the Christmas season begins in the early spring, just after a winter siesta.  During the spring planning begins for the upcoming season's special ornaments. Each year we create a special and entirely new ornament or ornaments to add to our line. This year our Sled Family has been added.

 

Making ornaments is a long and drawn out procedure shared by both Mina andher husband, Brian. While Brian assists in development of new ornament ideas in design, he also makes many of the cutters needed for new designs. But it's Mina who's the artist/master crafter. Her touch is delicate, a necessary trait for assembly of so many intricate ornaments.

All ornament baking is done in our home convection oven. Ornaments bake for many hours at low temperatures. But that's not the end of their  journey. Next the are hand decorated. This is when faces, polka dots or whatever each piece necessitates, is added.  Finally the ornaments head to the liquid plastic bath where they get a generously thick coating of clear liquid plastic. After drying for 12 hours or more they're ready to be personalized for sale.