Santa’s Helper Casts Her Lot in Trees

A sign at Robin Tyler’s Christmas tree lot in North Hollywood reads: Santa had to be a woman. Who else would have given so much and received so little in return?

A feminist Christmas tree lot? Well, not exactly.

Tyler, a comic and a gay activist, says she just thought people might enjoy a bit of humor while buying their Christmas trees. This is Tyler’s first year in the tree-selling business, and she says she’s learned a lot that will help her when she opens her Good Fairies’ lot next Christmas.

“I’m Jewish, and I didn’t know from a Noble to a Douglas fir, but I do now,” Tyler said this week. “The reason I decided to do this is that I’ve had a good year and I wanted to give something back. I figured it would cost about $5,000 and the rest we’d give to charity. It’s cost $15,000 so far, but today I broke even, and the rest we make will go to the Southern California Council on Battered Women and the Unity Fellowship Minority AIDS Outreach program. I am trying, in my way, to tell people that even though there is the dread of AIDS, there also is happiness and joy in the gay community.”

Tyler said she thought she probably could have run her tree lot more cheaply by asking for volunteers from the gay community to help sell the trees for charity, but then she decided instead to hire “neighborhood kids who are out of work this season.”

The Good Fairies’ lot, on Sherman Way and Allott Avenue, is open from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m. Next year, Tyler plans to move her lot to West Hollywood where she will be more visible to the gay community, she explained.

“This is the only place I know where you get sunburned selling Christmas trees,” Tyler joked.

A Flock of Angels

It comes as no surprise that Christmas trees are in the news in Los Angeles this week, but have you seen the surfer angels?

The unusual angel decorations can be found on the tree of angels being displayed at the Greater Los Angeles Visitors and Convention Bureau’s L.A.’s the Place boutique in Arco Towers.

There are about 200 ornaments of the winged creatures--the traditional Christmas ones and some that definitely fit the Southern California image, surfing, skateboarding, roller-skating and tennis playing angels.

These Southern California angels were designed by a Benedictine monk, Dom Maur van Doorslaer, and handcrafted in ceramic by other priests from St. Andrew’s Priory, a Benedictine monastery near the high desert community of Valyermo, Calif.

After deciding to have a Christmas tribute to the City of Angels, Michael Osborn, the bureau’s director of licensing, and his staff assembled the assortment of ornaments, thought to be one of the largest collection of angel ornaments in the Los Angeles area, with some of the decorations coming from East Germany and Czechoslovakia, and the Far East, as well as many from the United States.

Many of the angels also are on sale at the boutique, among them St. Andrew’s Priory angels, duck and bear angels created by the “Just Ducky” artists in Laguna Beach, cornhusk angels from Iowa, hand-painted wooden ones from East Germany, rope ones from the Philippines, glass ones from Czechoslovakia. There are angel candles, leaded-glass figures, brass wall hangings, Christmas cards, and music boxes in addition to the ornaments.

“To say it’s been successful is an understatement,” Osborn said of the bureau’s boutique, which opened the last week of the Olympics and normally sells L.A.’s the Place items, T-Shirts, sweaters, posters, etc. Proceeds from sales at the boutique go back to the bureau for the promotion of tourism in Los Angeles.

“We’re pleased about the angels,” he added. “They have been really well received, and they help to reinforce that we really are the City of Angels.”

Special holiday hours are 8:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. Monday through Friday, Saturday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

As soon as Christmas is over, the boutique staff will set up a Rose Bowl theme for its merchandise, featuring souvenirs of the Iowa Hawkeyes and the UCLA Bruins. Next comes a Super Bowl theme for January.

“We don’t know yet who’ll be in the Super Bowl,” Osborn said. “But wouldn’t it be great if it was the two L.A. teams?”

Ornamental Habits

Speaking of holiday ornaments, Tena Smith of Culver City worked an entire year crocheting enough colorful Christmas balls to fill her friend Carmen Sanchez Sadek’s whole tree.

“She made four of them for me last year,” Sadek said, “so I said I wanted a whole tree full this year. Now everybody who sees them wants them.”

Smith, 51, said she has been crocheting since she was 12 years old, and mostly makes up her own patterns from looking at photos, characters on greeting cards. “I made a whole bunch of animal ornaments for a Christmas tree before. My favorites are the animals, horses, unicorns, bears, raccoons, skunks, and the birds.”

Not only does Smith crochet ornaments all year, she makes dolls, clowns and bears for her grandchildren and her friends’ children. When her own children--four by a previous marriage and four Smith stepchildren--were growing up, she couldn’t make the dolls and animals fast enough. Her largest item is a four-foot crocheted clown.

The big clown takes Smith “every evening for a week” to complete; a foot-high set of carolers with four people and a dog and a lamppost, takes her about two weeks to organize and finish.”

Smith, who lives in a mobile home in Culver City with her husband Don, a retired mail truck driver for the Los Angeles Unified School District, said she didn’t make any ornaments of her own because their Christmas tree is too small to hold large handmade ornaments.

Next year, Sadek and her neighbor Darley Marks, who introduced Smith to Sadek, plan to help Smith line up some Christmas boutiques and toy fairs where she can sell her crocheted wares. Smith says that Sadek and Marks are her “critical advisers.”

“I learned to crochet watching my mother,” Smith said, explaining that she grew up with six sisters and her mother and father on a poor Appalachian farm in Tennessee. “Mom sewed with yardage and crocheted things for us. She made all of our clothes. So that’s how I learned. But I never did learn to knit.”

Strictly Personal

If you’re still looking for that one unusual Christmas gift, you might consider the mini-breathalizer being offered by Beverly Hills Motoring Accessories, the Neiman-Marcus of the car set.

The firm offered the $149.95 personal breathalizer last year, but representatives say that this year, with California’s crackdown on drunk drivers and the CHP holiday roadblocks, sales are booming.

“We’re selling them at a tremendous rate,” said Kaycie Lane, vice president of sales and marketing for BHMA. “The phones are ringing off the hook, not just from people here, but from up north and out of state, too.”

Made in West Germany, the breathalizer is a hand-held device that can instantly tell its user whether his or her blood-alcohol level is within the legal limits.

Lane said that corporations, as well as individuals, are also purchasing the electronic breathalizer devices this season. “With company Christmas parties and New Year’s on the horizon, companies are worried about employees and the possibility of drunk driving. There’s a little more fear this year about drunk driving. You get a sense of paranoia coming over the phone when the people call.”