JL Christmas Village Calendar

There are some really fun aspects of this most recent calendar. The option to create a sweater design to be worn by people around the village is a great touch. The pub quiz is also a great addition to the mix and I have had a lot of fun with it. It is also great to see the Santa Drop game back. So addictive! The other games that are regular features are also as fun as always. Plus, the music is great and of course the customary two-tiers of the calendar are wonderful. I just love that! With all that said, however, there are places where the calendar runs into trouble, I feel. For one thing, once the town is built, there is much too much going on in one place: the foreground. You have the skating rink right up front. The bridge over the pond (a feature that I always enjoy, as it lends so much charm to any scene) is also really close to the front. Then you have the dress-up snow people and the clock on a pole - both great features - but they too are at the forefront. Also, there are people walking back and forth and various vehicles driving through, which is customary, but not only does this contribute to a really cluttered feel, it often proves to be an obstruction when you find an elf. Many of them start their cute little dance also in the foreground and invariably some passing car, or people block your view of it. All in all, there is just too much going on up front and this is neither pleasing nor relaxing to look at, as past calendars have been (despite the customary activity). The scene is out of balance. The other thing I find disappointing is that, despite the fact that you can expand the scene to reveal another charming one behind it, the roofs, spires and chimney of some of the buildings in the foreground do block parts of the view of the background scene that would be great to see more of (or in some cases, all of). For example, the scene with folks sitting outside the eatery in the background (complete with a fire pit!) would have been so much better if it had been designed in a way that allowed the viewer to see the entirety of it, instead of being obstructed by a chimney and rooftop from the scene below. On another note, during the earliest days of the month, I rather enjoyed watching animals and birds moving around the scene. At the same time, it was so obvious that they (like so many other calendar features) had been taken from a previous calendar (in this case it was the 2023 Edwardian calendar), which was pretty unoriginal of you guys. Still, I was unhappy that the critters all disappeared once the town was all built. As for building the town from scratch, it’s not bad or anything, but to me it really just feels like a gimmick, rather than anything particularly special or exciting. It’s just there. Another thing I noticed was that there seemed to be fewer things to decorate in the streets (like the Christmas tree on the bridge, street lights, bushes…). I kind of missed those because they add to the festiveness. Lastly, I was surprised at the omission of bells tolling the hour, despite the presence of a church. Perhaps they are not a must, but they sure do add a cheery holiday feel to a scene!