Frosty Snuggle Buds

The Gayla Pink Apple

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Meet Frosty Snuggle Buds

 

Who would you rather snuggle with than Santa? I can't imagine! 

Frosty Snuggle Buds Ornament

by Christoper Radko

 

I love this darling Santa ornament called Frosty Snuggle Buds.  Santa in his pink stripped pajamas with candy canes on them - so cute!  Takes a real man to wear pink, huh!  Doesn't that look just like something a little girl would choose?  I love Santa's face - the detail is fantastic.  It's hard to see in the photo so take my word for it.  He sits front center towards the top of my tree every year.

My admiration for these mouth blown glass ornaments started with my association with the Garden Club ladies many years ago.  I always loved pretty things - crystal - silver - guess you could say -things that sparkle and shine!  I developed an appreciation for pretty things and even more for things made with love by artisans.  The Garden Council board of directors gave me a Christopher Radko ornament one year as a Christmas gift and my collection started.  My first ornament was called A Gardener's Christmas, which was a wheel barrow with a Christmas tree in it.  Very fitting gift. 

 

Years ago my daughter started selecting an ornament for me each year.  My collection grew rapidly - mostly because it was an easy gift to select for me and one that always fit.  My mother, sister, and my young daughter would buy an ornament for me every year - almost always at Christmas - but also for birthday, Mother's Day, etc.  Before you knew it, the collection developed, grew, and then it became a focus. 

The original Christoper Radko ornaments are mouth blown in tempered glass lined with sterling silver and hand painted by artisans in Europe.  If you're not familiar with Christopher's story - it is a wonderful story of how the ornaments came to be.

It began with a family calamity in 1984, Christopher Radko decided that his family's rusty old Christmas tree stand needed to be replaced.  He replaced the stand and put their 14 ft. tree in a new aluminum model.  His family decorated the tree as always, with a treasured collection of over 2,000 mouth-blown, European glass ornaments.  One week before Christmas, the new stand gave way and the tree crashed to the floor, shattering almost every ornament.

Heartbroken, Christopher decided to try to replace his family's heirlooms.  Ornaments sold in the US were, at the time, made of plastic and styrofoam, not capable of replacing the handmade treasures his family had collected over generations.  While visiting in Poland, Christopher began looking for glass ornaments.  He found a man eager to revive the art of his great-grandfather and Christopher encouraged him to recover antique ornament molds, supplied him with sketches of his own childhood favorite ornaments.  Several dozen ornaments were produced for his family, but those ornaments never made it to the family tree.  Instead, friends in New York purchased all of them. 

On his next trip abroad, he brought back more ornaments which sold out as well.  Christopher realized he had discovered something wonderful.  While at his job in the mailroom of a talent agency, he spent his lunch hours going door-to-door to stores in New York City, showing his designs.  His first retail account was a jewelry store in NYC and his success skyrocketed.  The attention to detail didn't waver.  Each ornament takes seven days to produce.  The skills of mold making, glass blowing and hand painting were proudly rekindled. 
 

Each ornament has a name and each year about one-third of them are retired, thus, enhancing their collectibility.  A Christopher Radko ornament is a work of heart!

Christopher Radko sold the company several years ago and for a while the quality didn't seem to measure up.  I stopped buying them because of it and today consider my collection pretty much complete. 

My collection is quite large.  A friend from the garden club council had a very large collection and several years ago her tree fell and almost all of her ornaments were broken.  I must admit, I sometimes do fear that my tree will fall, so far it has not happened. 

 

Each year as I put up my Christmas tree and decorate it with all of these glorious ornaments, I'm reminded of events, people, and stories associated with each.   For example, there's a grey puppy dog that looks just like the little schnauzer we had for 16 1/2 years. There's Dorothy's ruby slippers - can't tell you how many times we've watched The Wizard of Oz.

My daughter selected Frosty Snuggle Buds as a gift to me. She was very young. My mother-in-law took her to Et Cetera in the Heights and told her to pick out any ornament she wanted for her Mother. 

Speaking of snuggling - what great fun to snuggle under the comforter or on the sofa and watch Christmas movies with your loved ones dressed in your Christmas pajamas!  That is what I'm reminded of when I see and/or think about this ornament.

Snuggling,

Gayla

P.S. Here are a few photos of some of the ornaments in my collection.

 

Santa sitting in his big chair - looking at his list of names!  The name Luke is on this ornament.  A unique and special friend of mine has a grandson named Luke.  This ornament reminds me of them. 

 

Snowman with big tummy - love his red and white cap, scarf and broom!

Double jointed ornament - Mr. and Mrs. Claus dangle from a Christmas Tree!

Santa with a big belly.  Love the detail of his black belt and the detail in Santa's beard is super. 

 



Double jointed ornament - Santa face dangles from Santa's hat!

This is a huge ornament.  Santa's workshop!  Love his old fashioned eye glasses on this one. 

As you can see, I favor Santa ornaments.  I have a nice assortment of all designs, but Santas are definitely first place. 

Merry Christmas to you,
Shinning Brightly
Santa Claus is coming to town,
G

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