Category: Fundraiser

While we are waiting for our printed Holiday House Tour materials to arrive and tickets to go on sale, we have some thanks and our first round of information to share about the tour.

1. First, thank you to everyone who has contributed shopping bags this year for the Bough & Dough Shop. We are close to our goal, but don’t let that discourage you from donating if you haven’t made it to the Hexagon House yet. We will happily take them through the rest of November. As always, any unused bags from this drive are held for the next year, or recycled if the bags cannot be reused.

2. If you ever wished you could place a custom order for finished greenery at the Bough & Dough Shop, we have you covered! Nate Windle will be taking custom orders for live and artificial greenery arrangements and wreaths this year. Be sure to place an order before Wednesday, November 22 with Nate to guarantee fulfillment. Pickup will be at 315 W. Boscawen St. on Sunday, Dec. 3 between 1-4 p.m.

3. While we gear up for the Shop, we also want to share a special, limited edition print of the Community Food Store. This landmark of South Kent Street was demolished in 2011 after it was deemed too structurally unsound to rehabilitate, but the memory of the building lives on. The image is reproduced from a watercolor of the store from 1989 with the familiar Coca-Cola, Pepsi, and RC Cola signs and vending machines in full color. The print itself is approximately 16″x20″, printed on an acid free substrate, with foam core backing and wrapped in cellophane for easy gift-giving or temporary display. The print run was limited to less than 50, and in total we have only 36 prints available for sale. You may pick one up at the PHW office or at the Bough & Dough Shop for $75 – either way, the proceeds from the print sales will be split 50/50 between PHW and the Winchester Little Theatre.

4. We expect tickets will go on sale by November 15 at the following locations:
The Final Yard, 33 East Gerrard Street
Kimberly’s, 135 North Braddock Street
Wilkins’ Shoe Center, 7 South Loudoun Street
Winchester Book Gallery, 185 North Loudoun Street
Winchester-Frederick County Visitors Center, 1400 South Pleasant Valley Road
And online at www.phwi.org

Tickets will also be available at the PHW Office, 530 Amherst Street, but please be mindful as the Hexagon House is undergoing some interior tune ups and we may have minor interruptions, dust, and the general hubbub of a building getting some TLC.

5. The online map to the ticket sale locations, tour stops, Bough & Dough Shop, and parking lots has been updated for 2017 and is available for viewing. We will note the houses are a bit more spread out this year than in some previous years, and the sidewalks may be challenging in some areas on Loudoun Street in particular. On-street parking will be very tight or non-existent on Loudoun and East Clifford Streets. Carpooling is recommended!

The guided walking tours on Sunday will only cover the Stewart and Washington Street neighborhood and are planned to take about 20 minutes. The tours will go past 21 South Washington Street if you want to hop off for a house tour, but they will also return to the Bough & Dough Shop if that is where you parked your car.

It’s that time again! PHW is at work on lining up sponsors for our 2017 Holiday House Tour. For many of us this event officially begins the holiday season with its guided tours of the festively decorated historic properties in Winchester. In addition to being a fun community tradition, the Holiday House Tour generates the monetary foundation that enables us to continue our mission to preserve the best of the area’s past.

As part of our promotional materials for the event, PHW will be producing a full color program booklet again this year. I invite you to place an ad in the booklet to show your support for PHW and to promote your business to a demographic interested in Old Town Winchester, its history, and its architecture. Ads are available in full page (5″x8″), half page (5″x4″), and business card (2″x3.5″) sizes. Enlarging the image shows the sizes, costs, and benefits of the sponsors’ ads in the program.

Please reserve your spot soon – ads are due by 5 PM on October 31 to ensure inclusion in the program booklet, which will be distributed in mid-November to ticket sale locations and local visitor centers around Winchester. Include your business name, contact information, and ad size in your reservation. Your print-ready digital ad files may be emailed to phwinc.org@gmail.com or submitted on CD or flash drive at the PHW Office, 530 Amherst Street, Winchester, VA 22601. If you have questions, do not hesitate to email us or call us at 540-667-3577.

Thank you for your support, and we hope to see you at our 41st Holiday House Tour this December 2 and 3!

Beaded Snowflakes

Marilynn lives in Middletown and has done various crafts before becoming addicted to beading. She has been at it for 6 – 7 years now.

She works with a large collection of beads in a variety of colors, shapes and sizes made of crystal, glass, resin, and wood.

She even has hand-made ceramic beads she bought as a young teenager which were simply strung into necklaces.

Now she stitches bracelets, earrings, and necklaces using beads of all kinds, some only 1/16″ in size.

Her snowflakes are created on metal forms with beads of various colors, shapes and cuts to catch the light when hung on a Christmas tree or in a window.

Beading requires creativity, an eye for color and texture combinations, plus a bit of dexterity and patience. There are so many beads and so many options; you just have to be open to the possibilities.

“Sometimes I even dream in beads!”

Steve and Abi Callahan

Jack Knuckle Gourmet, Winchester’s first gourmet food truck, was opened in 2014 by dynamic husband and wife team Steve Callahan and Abigail Gomez. Steve has been a chef in the industry for over 20 years, and was thrilled to be involved in bringing the exciting food truck culture to the area!

JKG specializes in delicious gourmet sandwiches, but along with street-side vending, they also offer on-site and in-home catering, with exquisitely prepared menus and mouth-watering creations from the skilled hands of the chef.

Whether you stop by the truck in Old Town Winchester, or have JKG cater your event, you are guaranteed to try something new and love every last bite.

Visit Jack Knuckle Gourmet at www.jackknucklegourmet.com and on Facebook.

Jack Knuckle Gourmet will serve lunch at the Bough & Dough Shop between 12-3 PM Saturday, Dec. 3 and Sunday, Dec. 4.Jack Knuckle Gourmet menu for Dec. 3 & 4.

Outside on the deck of the Winchester Little Theatre awaits a bounty of freshly-cut greenery for your holiday decorating. Buy greenery in bulk by the bag at the Bough & Dough Shop this weekend, including pine, juniper, magnolia, spruce, nandina, holly, and boxwood, or buy handmade decorated wreaths, arrangements, and bows for your decorating needs. Special thanks are due to Lynne Caldwell, Cheryl Crowell, Donna Downing, Howard and Joan Lewis, and Nancy Murphy for providing the bulk greenery.

Nate Windle will return again with fabulous finished greenery creations. In addition to the traditional fresh greenery wreaths and arrangements you have come to expect at the Bough & Dough Shop, Nate will provide some limited artificial greenery decorations so you can enjoy his artistic skills for years to come. If you are making your own arrangements from the bulk greenery, you can also expect a selection of bows made by Nate that are suitable for adding the finishing touch to your handiwork.

Graustark Farm’s Fiber Products

Linda Brown has been spinning, weaving and felting with fiber for over fifteen years. Her foray into the fiber world started with spinning angora from her daughter’s 4H bunny. From there she progressed to raising a few sheep and llamas. After realizing how soft, luxurious and easy to clean the llama fiber could be, Linda developed a breeding program to raise a variety of llamas specifically for their soft fiber and good temperaments. Llama fiber is different from sheep wool in that it is a hair fiber which has no barbs and contains no lanolin.

Through the farm business, Graustark Farm LLC, Linda uses her llamas’ fiber to create custom wearing apparel and accessories through weaving, knitting, crochet and felting. The process starts on the farm with shearing in the spring and then progresses through hand spinning the yarn to weaving or other needlework. Almost all of Linda’s designs are created with her own handspun yarn from llamas living on the farm; other fibers may be added for color or texture. In addition to using llama fiber for her own designs and private commissions, Linda creates with the other farm fibers of alpaca and Romney wool as time allows. The farm participates in fiber shows and promotes llama fiber as a new horizon in luxury fiber.

Linda feels that education about llamas and their wonderful fiber is as important as the sale itself. She hold the position of Senior Consultant with the Camelidynamics program of llama and alpaca handling and training as well as being active in several regional llama associations. Graustark Farm displays llamas and Linda’s fiber art in various settings, such as the Bluemont Fair, Shenandoah Valley Fiber Festival, the Blue Ridge Spinners and Weavers Guild, Franklin Park Arts Center Gallery and of course by appointment on the farm. Learn more about llamas and their fiber on the farm web site, www.graustarkllamas.com