A different kind of Christmas village

I have been debating starting one of those ceramic house village collections for quite awhile now.  The ones by Lemax at the local Michaels always seemed kind of, well, a little cheesy to me and roughly made.  However they are affordable which can't really be easily said about what I was really considering, Dept. 56 houses.  There was even a store of theirs locally where we could go and look at all the different villages they carried.  I think we ended up in there every Christmastime looking and wishing we could afford to start a village.

Now that Mister Vonkysmeed's employment status is more stable I decided to definitely start a collection this year and had even researched a local store that carries Dept. 56 villages for me to go look again.  Then I ended up on the LEGO website to request a free magazine subscription for Lil' Miss and one thing led to another until I discovered this,

LEGO Winter Village Bakery, 10216

Yup, LEGO has gotten into the Christmas village business and they have a new customer in me!  This is the third year they have produced a new building and with Mister Vonkysmeed's blessing I have ordered all three buildings to get us started.

With these buildings we get the additional fun of assembling them together as a family, always a good thing in my book!  Additionally they are not made out of fragile porcelain as the other villages are, always a bonus in this family with young kids and a 'bull in a china shop' kind of hubby!