'Enchanted Village' brings holiday cheer to families near and far

AVON – It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas., and Thanksgiving is still weeks away.

But at the "Enchanted Village" inside Jordan's Furniture, "snow" fluttered overhead as families went ice-skating, took photos with Santa Claus and celebrated the coming holidays.

The Enchanted Village drew people to the Avon furniture store Saturday during the village's opening weekend. The experience, which includes a walk through snowy Christmas scenes and moving figurines, will be open until Sunday, Jan. 2.

For many visitors, it wasn't their first time in the village.

"I just think it's absolutely beautiful," Susan Puggioni said, sitting on a bench while her children and grandchildren enjoyed the 4D "Polar Express."

The Watertown grandmother said she most loved the "snow" made of light bubbles churned out of lampposts scattered around the village.

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And although Puggioni said the right time to start preparing for Christmas is around Thanksgiving, she wasn't too strict about it.

"Christmas can go all year-round," she said, joking.

Weymouth mother Linda Moscardelli said, preparations for Christmas should start the day after Thanksgiving. Still, her family was filling its time with holiday activities, she said.

"There's not enough weekends," Moscardelli said, adding that her family plans to ride the Polar Express train on the Cape in a few weeks.

Marielle Tassinari, of Plymouth, was eating ice cream with her 7-year-old daughter, Ruby. Christmas celebrations should start "any time after Halloween," Tassinari said. "Nothing wrong with being in the Christmas spirit."

"I wish it was already Christmas," Ruby said.

Tassinari said her daughter enjoyed the ice-skating at the village, along with the Polar Express. It wasn't their first time at the Enchanted Village, and the new addition of a tube slide this year was also fun, Tassinari said.

"The whole experience was fantastic," she said.

Jordan's Furniture bought pieces of the display, formerly a regular feature at Jordan Marsh and Macy's in downtown Boston, at an auction in 2009.

With all the new bells and whistles of the village, some visitors recalled a time when it was just the Enchanted Village: model houses with animatronic dolls enacting holiday scenes in downtown Boston, not Avon.

Melrose resident Chris Rolinson said she used to go the Enchanted Village as a child, and Saturday she was watching her grandchildren as they experienced old and new exhibits on opening weekend.

"All it was was the village," she said. "It was Christmas tradition."

Rolinson said visiting the village is nostalgic for her now, and she remembers going to Downtown Crossing in Boston when the experience was hosted by Macy's. After, her family would walk through Boston Common and enjoy the lights, she said.

She's followed the Enchanted Village for most of her life, Rolinson said, and now she gets to experience the older quaint village scenes along with new tube slides and ice-skating with her grandchildren.

Still, Rolinson said she prefers to hang up Christmas decorations and lights after Thanksgiving.

"That's how I was brought up," she said. "It can be the day after Thanksgiving. The tree goes up, the lights go outside."

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Reach Alex Weliever at aweliever@patriotledger.com.

This article originally appeared on The Patriot Ledger: Jordan's Furniture opens 'Enchanted Village' to families