LIVERMORE – Volunteers carefully placed Bubble Wrap on fireplace mantles to prevent scratching before placing fir boughs, fruit, black walnuts, sea shells, candles and other Christmas decorations at the Washburn-Norlands mansion.

In the 1870s, they would have kept it simple because Christmas wasn’t celebrated that much, volunteer Louise Lavoie of Livermore said, as she and others prepared the mansion for the Christmas at Norlands celebration from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 8. It wasn’t until the French Catholics came to the area and brought Christmas that it was celebrated, she added.

“The first time I came here, I came to decorate the tree. They didn’t have enough help and they needed volunteers, and I was hooked,” Lavoie said.

Then Lavoie brought in her husband, Shanel, who was cutting boughs Wednesday, as well as trimming a Christmas tree and hanging garland and bows around portraits of the Israel Washburn family.

Curator Jennifer Colby-Morse was decorating the dining room in the 1898 era. The table was set formal with silverware for each course and the Washburn china, all embossed with a gold W for the family’s last name.

“The Washburns themselves didn’t really come here at Christmas; they came at Thanksgiving,” she said. The house was built in 1867, and by then the seven Washburn sons and three daughters were adults, she added. They celebrated Christmas at their own homes.

Colby-Morse planned to decorate the rooms in different periods so that visitors would have a learning experience about celebrations of Christmas as it evolved.

During Christmas at the Norlands, tours of the mansion will be given. Willi Irish, director of interpretation, will portray Clara Howard, the nosy neighbor, and read stories in the ladies’ parlor, and Jerry Ellis will play the piano, Director Nancey Drinkwine said.

The group “Fiddleheadz” will provide entertainment, and there will likely be wagon rides instead of sleigh rides due to the weather.

Kids will have a chance to make paper chains and string popcorn and do other period crafts.

There will also be a cookie walk and a boiled pot luncheon of a soup with meat and vegetables.

There will also be a gingerbread structure contest in which visitors will be invited to bring their best gingerbread house, tree or what ever structure they have made out of gingerbread. A $5 fee will be charged for the contest to help with prize costs.

In addition, a ladies’ barbershop quartet group will lead caroling that begins at 4 p.m. and ends at 5.

A ham dinner will be served at 5:30 for a cost of $25.

Continuing the center’s long tradition of community support, there will be a collection for quality winter coats, hats and mittens for the statewide “Coats for Kids” campaign. Anyone who donates a coat or jacket will be entered into a door prize raffle.

The money raised during the festivities will go toward educational programming at Norlands.