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The Central Kansas Mental Health social worker donned his robe, tied on his head covering and grabbed his shepherd staff Saturday to give a first-person account at the Old Mill Museum's Old Fashioned Christmas event about the night angels appeared to herald the birth of Christ.

"For all my courage confronting a lion or a bear, nothing could prepare me for the fear which filled every part of my body," Shepherd Presley told a small audience about the moment the angels appeared. "My legs couldn't hold me up, and my breath seemed to hide inside of me, afraid to come out."

Presley has been performing the shepherd's story at the annual event for 11 years. He said he tried to imagine what it would be like to be a shepherd who heard angels sing and actually saw the Christ child as he wrote the story.

"I enjoy it and look forward to it every year," he said.

Presley will be performing as a shepherd again at 5:15, 5:45 and 6:15 p.m. next Saturday in the livery stable on museum grounds during the second weekend of Old Fashioned Christmas activities. Dec. 12 is St. Lucia Day, and the museum expects a large crowd to attend its evening events following the traditional daytime celebration, said Lorna Nelson, museum director.

Musical acts planned in the Swedish Pavilion on museum grounds are Dulcimers, Etc., at 5 p.m.; Swedish Dancer Fiddlers at 6 p.m.; Bethany Brass Ensemble at 6:30 p.m.; Smoky Valley Men's Choir at 7 p.m.; and Men in Harmony at 7:30 p.m.

Smoky Valley High School drama students will also be performing "Christmas in the Depot," and pioneer crafts for children will be available in the one-room schoolhouse. The grounds will be lit with kerosene lanterns, and guided tours of the 1898 flour mill will be available every half hour.

During the first weekend of the Christmas event, Steve Reed, of Lindsborg, awaited children in the museum gallery wearing one of his six Santa Claus outfits. He and elf Joe Collette, of Ellsworth, distributed candy canes.

"I've only had one tell me what she wanted for Christmas so far -- a green floor lamp," Santa said.

His beard is real, but he uses spray to turn it white when he's in Santa mode, Reed said.

Last year he was too sick with pneumonia to be Santa at the museum event, he said. When he heard doctors say they wanted to shave his beard, his blood pressure -- which had taken a dive -- spiked back to normal and he sat up, he said.

"The doctor said, 'I guess we won't cut off his beard,' " Reed said.

By Christmas Eve last year, he was again playing Santa for friends' children.

"I enjoy it very much," he said. "I had to do it for the children."

Salina folk musician Thad Beach played harmonica and guitar and recruited volunteers from the audience to assist in playing Christmas music on shakers, bells, a washboard and a pickle bucket bass.

The first step in constructing a bass out of a pickle bucket, a broom handle and a parachute cord is eating the pickles, Beach said.

"I ate five gallons of pickles in three hours," he told the audience. "Three or four weeks later when I was feeling better, I made this."

Marilyn Myers, of Little River, agreed to try playing the bass for "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer."

Beach instructed her to "always put your right foot on top of the bucket, never your wrong foot."

Myers told him to hurry.

"I can't stand like this long," she said.

Myers said she had attended Bethany College and brought her grandchildren to Lindsborg on Saturday to experience Swedish culture.

"I don't know if that bucket playing is very Swedish," she said.

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