By Tucker Henderson

Reporter

Each year, Farmer’s Daughter Rustic Bakery in New York Mills is decked out as a Christmas wonderland when owner and operator Lisa Kopveiler starts decorating at the beginning of November.  ¶  “I started the beginning of November,” said Kopveiler. “Right after Halloween because there’s so much. We counted, we have 97 Santas and we have 51 trees, that includes all the little ones on the shelves. And I don’t know how many bulbs.”  ¶  Kopveiler does all of the decorating herself and says that she isn’t sure how much time it really takes, but she would estimate it would take a full week of no interruptions to finish the job each year.  ¶  “I have a couple trees that take about 10 hours from start to finish,” Kopveiler said. “Then the rest isn’t too bad.”  ¶  Despite having 51 trees up this year, that number does not complete Kopveiler’s entire collection of Christmas decor. She has more of the decorations in storage which she changes out each year.

“You rotate it around,” she said. “A couple of the trees I always keep the same, some of the other ones, I’ll switch them out and do different things. I always add a couple different little things. This year, we did nutcrackers. I keep collecting gingerbreads, so you got to keep adding. I wore out my space over there, I had to move it to a new location, so I’ve got two of them going. Gotta keep people on their toes,” she laughed.

Kopveiler has innumerable Christmas ornaments, but she has a special place in her heart for a particular tree topper.

“The oldest ornament that I have that I know of is 58 years old,” she explained. “It was my grandma’s Christmas tree topper that my dad had bought for my grandma when he was dating my mom.”

This humble decoration is a large part of Kopveiler’s love for decorating each Christmas season. She remembers visiting her grandma’s home each Christmas and watching the tree topper spin with her cousin.

“When I was little, that Christmas tree ornament, my cousin and I used to lay on the floor and watch it spin,” she said. “It’s got a little nail in it and it’s got a plastic cup that’s got dots on it and it spins with the air flow. I remember laying under the tree and just thinking, ‘wow.’ We’d have our feet tucked in there and we’d just look up at the ceiling and watch it twirl.”

Kopveiler says that her favorite part of decorating each Christmas is the beauty and peace that it brings each December.

“The beauty of it,” she said. “When you get to see it all with the lights on the music playing, it’s just peaceful and relaxing.”