Advent Madness

This year I had a nice surprise at the start of December: A gift of a Noch figures advent calendar.

Image from Amazon.

I'd been umming and arring about having one of these for the last few years as a bit of fun, but was always a bit put off by the fact the figures are of course HO scale. However, some of them could find uses in odd corners or at the very extreme, find use as passengers in coaches.

One thing that's interesting to note about these calendars are that the box states there are no Christmas figures included. This might put off some, but I can see the logic behind it. It's far easier to cater for almost every modeller out there this way rather than just those who want a winter/Christmas themed layout.

So what does eight days worth of Advent look like so far? Well...

In order of appearance we have a Vicar, a Doe (A deer, a female deer), a Stag, a sitting person who looks a tad miffed, a lady with her hands up in either a holding/throwing/intensely arguing pose, a swimming lady, a boy swimmer who suspiciously looks like he's running along the poolside, and lastly.... a bench.

I jest, but I am really enjoying this so far. So much so that even at this early stage I think I might have another next year. One thing that did strike me was that I was only expecting 'people' figures, so you can image my surprise on days two and three when the deer appeared. Even the bench got a laugh from me yesterday.

Yes, I can certainly agree with the no festive figures idea. But now comes the challenge...

...

Just HOW could I work those swimmers into a layout?