It was Sequim resident Angela Jeziorski’s first time at the annual Country Christmas event in Quilcene, and what caught her eye was a cardinal.

“I love cardinals,” Jeziorski said, as she cupped a carved likeness of the bird in her palm Nov. 19. “I heard this was going on from my crocheting class, and I love the Picket Fence anyway.”

The Picket Fence gift shop in Quilcene has conducted holiday open houses for a number of years, but last year marked the first time it partnered with other vendors.

“The Picket Fence has really cool, vintage stuff,” Jeziorski said. “I’m always avidly hunting for stuff you just can’t find at Walmart.”

Picket Fence co-owner Kara Lee noted that Country Christmas expanded from 14 vendors last year to 21 this year, which prompted them to add the local Masonic Lodge as a vendor space this year after they’d already added the Quilcene Community Center last year.

“We wanted to give the vendors room to breathe,” Lee said.

Silverdale resident Helen Stoker, a 93-year-old whose roots in Brinnon date back to when she was 2, is already a regular presence at the Picket Fence’s spring plant sales, so checking out Country Christmas was a no-brainer for her.

“It’s a real community here,” Stoker said of the event. “Everyone’s working hard to make their sales. They’re very friendly, and you get to know them as people.”

Quilcene locals Linda Maden and her mother, Jeanne Klingensmith, have been coming to the Picket Fence during the holidays for 20 years.

“They offer unique gifts and old-fashioned products,” Maden said. “It really is a country Christmas atmosphere.”

Fellow Quilcene native Kathi Cherry was there as a vendor, selling hand-painted seashells for the second year in a row.

“I collect from local beaches,” said Cherry, who explained that an auto mishap left her with “lots of time” for recovery. “It’s a form of therapy. I just paint whatever comes to mind. I’ll spend one day cleaning the shells, and three days or more painting them. They can be used as yard art.”

Westport artist Deb Stoltenberg, who had her own corner of the Quilcene Community Center, has been making her seashell art for more than 20 years.

“It started as a joke from my relatives back in Nebraska about how many oysters we ate,” Stoltenberg said. “So I sent them seven Christmas ornaments I’d made out of oysters.”

Stoltenberg appreciates the tactile range of oyster shells, which can be both heavy and light, and she embellishes them by firing clay directly onto the shells, using the shape of the shells to hide her designs of snowmen, fishermen, firefighters, police officers or Santa Claus.

“Santa’s my most popular ornament design by far,” Stoltenberg said, noting she’s made 5,000. “My ornaments have been included on the White House Christmas trees of both Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, so it doesn’t matter whether you’re a Democrat or a Republican,” she said with a laugh.