🎄A Cloisonné Day of Giving:
​Give Twice This Holiday Season
Through December 15

Have you ever heard the 1957 Toys for Tots theme song?
You can find a Youtube version (with Peggy Lee) at the bottom of this page.
Here is an Apple Music link 
Here are some of the lyrics:

Toys for Tots,
Toys for Tots,
The joy you give is dearer than you’ll ever know. One little toy,
Can mean so much,
To one small child who’s waiting for a Christmas glow.

Toys for Tots,
Are never bought,
With anything but love — you give to one and all. So please give a toy,
You’ll bring joy,
When you give a little toy for Tots this Christmas.”

I discovered this song many years ago while listening to an album called Christmas Cocktails, Part 1. It's a collection of holiday music by big bands and crooners from the 40's and 50's.

Historical Notes: How This Promotional Record Was Originally UsedHere is what’s historically accurate and well-documented:
​
📅 Year: 1956

• The song was commissioned by the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve as the official theme for the Toys for Tots program.
• Songwriters: Sammy Fain (melody) and Paul Francis Webster (lyrics) — both major Academy Award-winning songwriters.

📀 Who recorded it? 
​Capitol Records assembled several of their most beloved artists:

• Nat King Cole
• Peggy Lee
• Nancy Wilson
• Some versions feature male studio narrators or announcers.

These were not separate recordings — it was a collaborative promotional track.
📻 How the record was used
This is the part that connects directly to your memory:

• It was pressed exclusively as a special 45 rpm promotional record.
• Distributed only to radio stations, U.S. Marines Reserve centers, department stores, and some civic groups.
• Intended for public service announcements, holiday charity drives, and radio rotation between Thanksgiving and Christmas.
• It was not intended as a chart hit.
• The spoken parts were included specifically so that DJs didn’t have to explain the program — the record did it for them.

💿 Why people heard it on later “Christmas Cocktails” compilations
In the 1990s, Capitol began digging into its archives for unusual holiday material.
The Toys for Tots theme was:

• historic,
• charmingly sentimental,
• and musically “on brand” with the retro lounge revival.

Thus, it was added to Christmas Cocktails Part One, which is how most people rediscovered it.

How and Why this has become a Holiday Memory for me

Every year, the holiday season brings back one of my most cherished memories.
When my daughter was young, I began a tradition called “Daddy Christmas Time.”
I would take her — and two neighbor girls who didn’t have fathers in their lives — to Big Lots with a simple mission:
“Here’s $200 and a few shopping carts.
Let’s see how many children we can make happy with this.”
As they filled the carts, I asked:

• Why this toy?
• Who might love it?
• What joy will it bring?

When we finished, we brought everything to the big Toys for Tots donation boxes by the front wall. I watched them lift each toy and drop it in, understanding — maybe for the first time — the joy of giving without expecting anything in return.
We ended each outing with lunch and ice cream, celebrating how lucky we were to be able to give.
That memory lives inside the music I listen to each holiday season — especially the 1956 Toys for Tots song sung by Nat King Cole, Peggy Lee & Nancy Wilson.

This holiday memory/story has inspired a new project...

✨ Introducing the Cloisonné Day of Giving
Choose a Piece → Reserve it → Donate Toys → Give Twice
I’ve curated a selection of cloisonné pieces to become for our first annual Toys for Tots campaign.
The prices are about 66% off retail. Click on the image of each piece for "Toy Value Pricing"

Day of Giving collection

​Here’s how it works...

1️⃣ Choose Your Piece (and reserve it by email)
Browse the pieces on the Cloisonne´ Days of Giving page and select the one you love. 
Email me to reserve it so you know it’s yours and I will mark it "unavailable". .

2️⃣ Donate Toys for Tots (or another children’s toy charity)
Each piece has a required toy donation amount.
Buy toys totaling that amount, donate them, and send me a photo of the receipt.

3️⃣ Pay the Cloisonné Giving Price
After I receive your receipt, I’ll send you your piece (or pieces) via USPS mail with free shipping.

4️⃣ Give TwiceHere’s the magic:

• You give once by donating toys to brighten a child’s holiday.
• And you give a second time by choosing what to do with your cloisonné piece:
  • Keep it as a reminder of your generosity, or
  • Gift it to someone who needs beauty and encouragement in their life.

​This is art that celebrates the joy of giving — twice.

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Here is a YouTube video I found which features Peggy Lee. The original song that is on the Christmas Cocktails, Part 1 album
​ included Nat King Cole and Nancy Wilson, along with Peggy Lee.