Throwback: First Keepsake Miniature Ornament Set
“Tiny Tea Party” combines the nostalgia of an old-fashioned tea set with the playfulness of a band of frolicking mice.
Imagine a friendly band of tiny mice filling the air with merriment as they host their own little tea party. Hallmark artist Ed Seale had visions of such a party when he created “Tiny Tea Party,” the first Keepsake Miniature Ornament set ever offered.
Tiny Tea Party
set of 6 ornaments
As the 1991 miniature line was coming together, Lorrie Kreit, who helped develop the offering, proposed designing a whole miniature scale tea set. Then Seale envisioned merry little mice inside the dishes, and the idea for “Tiny Tea Party” was on its way.
“From the beginning, I wanted to use mice because their size fits in with a miniature set like this one, and they just seemed perfect,” Seale says. Other animals such as bunnies and chipmunks were considered, but mice won out.
Seale and the Keepsakes staff wanted the six-dish set to resemble a real glazed china tea set, so the dishes were made from fine porcelain.
“We wanted the set to be a little piece of nostalgia,” he said.
And the mice, who are having their own little party, add a hint of fun and playfulness. One of the mice, “Teacup Taster,” is busily stirring while “Teacup Lounger” appears in a moment of quiet repose as he takes a break from the festivities.
All six pieces can either hang from a tree or stand on a table, mantel or other setting in your home.
Reprint of: “Tiny Tea Party,” First Keepsake Miniature Ornament Set, Serves Up Fun and Nostalgia
Collector’s Courier: Volume Five, Number One 1991
NOTE: For a complete listing of all Ed Seale’s beloved tiny mice sets and other coordinating pieces, click on the “Unofficial series” button (located on the right sidebar) and then scroll down to “Tiny Mice Sets.”
Meet Hallmark Keepsake Artist, Joanne Eschrich
Though not an official Keepsake artist signing event, you can meet Joanne Eschrich and see her new Hallmark Artist Collection faith gifts on May 2 at Ashwina’s Hallmark in Sierra Vista, AZ.
Date: Saturday, May 2, 2015
Ashwina’s Hallmark
Sierra Vista Plaza
2160 E Fry Blvd.
Sierra Vista, AZ 85635
(520) 458-0922
2015 KOC Dream Book Cover (UPDATED)
KOC members, get excited! The 2015 Keepsake Ornament Club Collectors Edition Dream Book will start shipping on Monday. That is in only SIX DAYS!
The cover of the KOC Dream Book showcases the 16th in the Toymaker Santa series. By Ken Crow. Which features Santa wearing a baseball cap while riding on a toy tractor.
If you look closely, Toymaker Santa’s hat has a crow on it. When Ken Crow was a little boy, he remembers watching his grandpa write letters on special stationery. Every letter had an image of a crow in a side view silhouette. Ken has always identified with that image and even takes a little crow figurine with him on trips and signing events.
UPDATE: (4.8.15) Keep an eye on your mailbox as the 2015 Keepsake Ornament Club Collectors Edition Dream Book has started to ship and has repordly been received by a few lucky KOC members.
ADDITIONAL HISTORICAL INFORMATION
Although the first booklet containing a pictorial review of the then current Keepsake ornament line was released in ’79, it wasn’t until ’90 that the “Dream Book” name was first included on the cover of the annual Keepsake Ornament catalog.
Featured Artist: Ruth Donikowski
Title:
Hallmark Senior Artist
(Retired)
Started at Hallmark:
October 1987
Started at Keepsakes:
January 2008
Hometown:
Born in
Paterson, New Jersey
Grew up in
Fair Lawn, New Jersey
Ruth Donikowski loves working with different kinds of materials—glass, metal, porcelain, fabric—you name it. Learn about the materials she used for some of her favorites in this year’s Hallmark Keepsake Ornament collection, and how the artist’s previous career as a baker helped prepare her.
In 1976, Ruth Donikowski and her husband, who worked for Macy’s, moved to Kansas City from Montclair, New Jersey, where Ruth had been an art teacher. At the time, Ruth took a job making food miniatures in a shop at Crown Center, across from Hallmark headquarters.
She used salt dough to make tiny, collectible replicas of hot dogs and hamburgers, creating dozens at a time. She then sealed the dough with varnish so the little novelty items would be moisture-proof. At the time, Ruth had no way of knowing that skill would come in handy again someday.
“I always wanted to work for Hallmark and thought it would be a distinct possibility,” Ruth said. Shortly after that, she started freelancing for Hallmark and was hired full-time in 1987. She officially became a Keepsake artist in 2008.
One of Ruth’s recent projects afforded her the opportunity to put her culinary skills to work once again, creating miniature treats for the tree this time.
Petite Treat
1 of the Extra Exclusives you can buy with a 2015 Keepsake Ornament Club membership.
Although this one’s made from styrene instead of dough, it still took Ruth on a trip down memory lane. “Just seeing that little cupcake as a miniature—it made me so happy,” she said.
This 2015 KOC exclusive ornament has an added bonus, it is a mini replica of the Christmas Cupcake series ornament to be released in 2016! In the final version of the full-size series piece, the peppermint you see on top will actually be made from two pieces of fabric rolled together and sliced. And what looks more like frosting on this ornament will become individual pieces of “coconut” on the series ornament.
Tasty Tannenbaum
6th in the Christmas Cupcake series
How do you get fabric to look like frosting? Well, this year’s Christmas Cupcake series ornament features a layering technique called “ruching.”
Ruth described it this way: “You run the stitching this way and that way, diagonally, and then there’s a running, gathering stitch straight down through the diagonal lines. And when you pull all of that, it takes it all up, and the fabric ruches.” The technique sounds fairly complex, but that’s just another day in the office for Ruth, who has tremendous skill as a seamstress to go along with her many other design talents.
Like every cupcake in the series, the base or “wrapper” is made of styrene and then painted to coordinate. Then as a finishing touch she added tiny plastic hearts and chunky glitter as the “sprinkles.”
Radiant Cross
One of the things that Ruth loves best about her job is that she gets to work with so many different kinds of materials. And there’s no better proof of that than this elegant cross.
A combination of glass and metal, the cross was inspired by Ruth’s fondness for camphor glass, a material used in a lot of vintage necklaces, pins and other antique jewelry. Ruth actually collects camphor jewelry, so she had plenty of research material to get her started on the project.
She used a vintage camphor piece for inspiration and crafted digital drawings from various angles for the engineers and the manufacturer. The front of the glass is smooth and the back has cut lines that feel like ridges. The edging of the cross is metal. The middle piece is a crystal, and the corners feature metal filigree.
Always Remembered
Another material that Ruth is quite fond of: porcelain. So that was an easy choice for the nautilus shell. “Porcelain is just a beautiful medium,” she said. “It’s very elegant.”
The nautilus is a natural symbol of the infinite, which obviously ties in seamlessly with the intention of the ornament. In small gold lettering, it says: “The ones we’ve lost are found in our memories.”
The ocean theme of the piece also made her think of growing up in Fair Lawn, New Jersey, and spending summer days on the Jersey Shore, which she visited again just last summer.
“I’ve always had an attraction to the ocean,” Ruth said. “I just love the sea and all the things that come from it.”
She created the mockup from paper clay after researching shells as part of her personal craft projects. “I like to take vintage bottles and solder sea shells onto them,” Ruth said. “Just another tribute to the sea.”
LIONEL Toymaker Santa Express
Complete ready-to-run electric train set. Includes: locomotive (with a Toymaker Santa engineer) and tender, gondola (with presents and two elf passengers), boxcar and caboose, all painted red with images from the beloved Toymaker Santa series and white snowflake graphics.
Available beginning November 6th.
LIONEL® Toymaker Santa Express
2015 DREAM BOOK PARTY Keepsake Ornament Sneak Peek
Hallmark has put together a presentation for local retailers to use in conjunction with their May 16th Dream Book Party event. In addition to revealing six new 2015 ornaments (two of which are the first additions of new series), and sharing an updated image of the Mary Hamilton’s Bears First-in-series piece, the presentation also previews a limited-quantity piece designed to complement the anniversary of a popular series, the three 2016 KOC membership ornaments and eight 2016 continuing series pieces.
Reveal: Gone Fishin’
Here is a sneak of another 2015 ornament, Gone Fishin’ by Matt Johnson.
Gone Fishin’
Throwback: Goin’ To Kansas City
Read about the first-ever Collector’s Club convention held in 1991 and all the excitement that went into creating a truly memorable event.
K.C. Santa
Convention Gift
First-Ever Collector’s Club Convention Set for 1991
The first-ever Hallmark sponsored is only six months away, and Club members are busy planning for what is already being billed as the Keepsake Ornament collectors’ event of 1991.
The two and one half day Hallmark Keepsake Ornament Collector’s Club convention, open only to active Club members, will feature an ornament preview, artists’ signings, workshops and special guest speakers.
The event is set for June 20 to 22 at the Hyatt Regency Hotel, near Hallmark’s headquarters in Kansas City.
“The Collector’s Club will be five years old next year,” says Rachel Perkal, manager of the Collector’s Club. “This seemed a good time to hold an event to bring a large number of our members together. We also thought the convention would be a way of letting our members know that we appreciate their loyalty.”
The agenda for the convention was put together after the Club surveyed a number of members about what they would like to see at a Club convention.
“Members from across the country played a big part in determining how this convention would be put together,” Perkal says.
The convention will give members a chance to meet representatives from the Collector’s Club and the Keepsakes department.
Artists and others who work behind the scenes to bring you Keepsake Ornaments will appear at the convention as well. Many of the Keepsake artists will be on hand to sign the ornaments they designed.
Clara Johnson Scroggins, a leading authority on Keepsake Ornaments and American Christmas ornaments, and many other guest speakers will appear at the event.
“Since this is the Collector’s Club’s first convention,” Perkal says, “we thought it was only appropriate to bring together some of the most important names in collecting Keepsake Ornaments.”
Events being planned for the first full day of the convention include an appearance by a surprise “celebrity” collector. Members who attend will also be among the first to see next year’s Keepsake Ornaments as we unveil the entire 1991 collection.
Members will have an opportunity to browse through displays showing some of Hallmark’s newest products, including collectibles, Merry Miniatures, cookie cutters, lapel pins, and much, much more.
Topics such as how Keepsake Ornaments are made, how to protect your ornament collection, and decorating with Keepsake Ornaments will be discussed by experts and in workshops. Members will also have a chance to ask questions about ornament collecting and Keepsake Ornaments during a special forum discussion on “What Collectors Think.” The forum panel will include members of the Keepsakes staff and representatives from the Club.
In the afternoon, members will be able to get their favorite Keepsake Ornaments signed during an artist autograph session. In addition, Clara Johnson Scroggins will be signing copies of her Keepsake Ornament Collector’s Guide at the special session.
“We want Club members to enjoy themselves, but we also want to give them the opportunity to learn more about Keepsake Ornaments and collecting them. We want the panel groups and other sessions to be as informative and educational as possible,” Perkal says.
Arrangements have been made for members to go on scenic tours of Kansas City on the second day of the convention. There will also be specially guided tours of the Hallmark facilities where Keepsake Ornaments are produced and distributed. Many of these tours are being arranged just for the convention. The day will end with an old-fashioned “Christmas at Home” banquet with prizes and other exciting surprises from the Collector’s Club.
One of the most important parts of the convention and one of the biggest reasons the Club decided to sponsor it won’t even be on the agenda, according to Perkal. And that’s to give members a chance to get together, meet each other and just get to know one another. The convention will also give members the chance to share stories about how they started collecting Keepsake Ornaments and about the size and contents of their collections.
“We’re really excited about bringing members from all across the country together and giving them the chance to share their interest in Keepsake Ornaments,” Perkal says.
Because of the large number of members who have already expressed an interest in attending the convention and the limited registration for the event, Perkal advises those wishing to attend to sign up as early as possible.
Every active member was mailed an information packet in late October with details on registration. If you did not receive your packet or if you have questions about the convention, contact the Club at 1-816-274-4000.
Reprint of: Collectors Agree: Goin’ To Kansas City
Collector’s Courier: Volume Four, Number Three 1990
Reveal: Limited Quantity Ornament
Here is a preview of one of the Limited Quantity ornaments available at Ornament Debut, Lady Tanager by Edythe Kegrize.
Lady Western Tanager
Limited Quantity
Complements The Beauty of Birds series
2014 Ornament Premiere/Ornament Debut Shopper Thank-you Gift
Hallmark Gold Crown Rewards customers, who purchase a Keepsake Ornament during Ornament Premiere Weekend (July 11-12, 2015) will get a coupon for a FREE Tippity-Tap Toy Soldier ornament for redemption with purchase of another Keepsake ornament beginning October 3, 2015.
Tippity-Tap Toy Solder
Special Edition