A Tour of the Mrs. Claus Apothecary

Many of you know I’m passionate about Christmas. Some of you also know that I’m passionate about my story / rendition of Mrs. Claus that I started building last holiday season when I wrote her origin story. This year, I transformed my kitchen into her apothecary, creating several original potions using special labels I commissioned from Etsy seller TheLostTurtleShop, who was excellent at working with me and my vision. I made an apothecary sign using a thrifted sign from Goodwill (and taking some design inspiration from a Halloween potion sign at Michaels), a set of apothecary drawers using boxes from Dollar Tree, a hanging bundle of various Christmas herbs from a forest branch, a Christmas tree in a cauldron, festooned with tiny hanging potion bottles, her apothecarist certificate, and even more. Perhaps my favorite, I made a Frost Mistletoe specimen that glows at night, with delicate and glittering frost reaching its fingers across the glass of the dome case. Every detail of the new kitchen décor was either made or fastidiously selected by me to fit Mrs. Claus’s personality and story.

You saw a tour of it as part of my holiday house tour, but that didn’t tell you anything about the back story of the apothecary and its contents, or of Mrs. Ingefær Claus herself. There’s so much more story to tell, so I wanted to tell it. This video was probably the most challenging one I’ve ever made, (it took two hours to successfully film 10 minutes of footage) but it’s the one I am most proud of: my favorite of any video I’ve made so far.

Many thanks to Jonathan Hiebert for his assistance in this video as well.

Finally before I share the video, I have to tell you what a remarkable experience it was to transform into Mrs. Claus for the first time for this. My friend Salena Thrasher is a wonderful hairstylist, and I took my wig over to her house for her to help me transform it and myself. The first time I looked in the mirror and saw myself in costume with the wig solidly on my head and styled to perfection, I felt a wonderful euphoria, like something was just beginning. I do hope to play Mrs. Ingefær Claus on a more regular basis as time goes on. This won’t be the last you see of or hear of her.

Welcome to the biggest and most heartfelt project of this entire holiday season for me. I hope you do enjoy it.