Christmas joy, around town...

Some readers might remember the Portland tradition of hunting for the Santa Clones. 

The short story is that a fellow named Chris Willis has been collecting plastic Santas for years and puts them on display somewhere around town—posting clues on his Instagram page as to their location. Last year all of the Santas wore masks (see my photos here / read about last year's installation here), this year there's just the one masked Santa.

There seemed to be some kind of message in that, a single mask in the crowd.

I finally got it when I read this post from Chris...

"The Santas are not masked this year. I wanted their bright glowing faces exposed for everyone to see. Hopefully someday soon we’ll all be able to do the same. Tiny band-aids on their arms show they’ve all been vaccinated, in support of ultimately kicking this pesky pandemic’s butt.

I hope my collection brings some much needed warmth and joy this year. Let’s hang in there Portland, we’ll get through this."

Vaccinated Santas! Perfect. If you look closely you can see a bit of a band-aid shadow on their arms.

The red-glow of all that Santa magic could be seen for a couple blocks.

The glow, combined with the Santa sign, hopefully alerts passers-by that something magical is going on inside the building and they should stop to take a peek.

Driving home after Santa-spotting I managed a quick photo of a very tall and festive tree. You can see downtown Portland in the distance.

Another evening, a different route home, and I was thrilled to discover this Grinch (and big opuntia clump!).

While I am not generally a fan of the over-done blow-up genre of front yard décor, seeing this one made my heart grow three sizes that night.

All material © 2009-2021 by Loree Bohl for danger garden. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited and just plain rude.