NATCHEZ — For some, nutcracker dolls are a seasonal decoration, but for Deede Daniels, they’re a year-round obsession.

When The Dart landed near her residence on Martin Luther King Jr. Street, Daniels’ had recently made the switch from Thanksgiving-themed nutcrackers to those with a more Christmas-y flare.

Most of the time, Daniels’ extensive collection stays atop shelves in the kitchen, but at Christmas she spreads them around the house.

But it’s the nutcrackers she keeps in the kitchen that catch the eye.

Those include a Cassanova doll, a Harlem Globetrotter, a Fisherman, a kilt-clad Scotsman, the Characters from the Wizard of Oz, Uncle Sam, the biblical Noah — and the list goes on, even including nutcrackers garbed in Mississippi State and LSU gear.

The collection started when a grandmother gave her oldest son, who is 22, a nutcracker one Christmas, but it has grown extensively since then.

Her son has helped her in the nutcracker hunt — he was the one who gave Daniels the LSU nutcracker — but she’s not ready to hand over the collection just yet.

“Every time he comes over he says, ‘Mom, I’m taking my nutcrackers,’ and I just have to say no,” Daniels said.

While she doesn’t actively hunt for nutcrackers, if one catches her eye — even in July — she will pick it up.

“Some years, we just see things that are different, but some years we don’t see as many,” Daniels said. “We haven’t gotten any this year.”

A few years ago, Daniels’ collection was threatened by a house fire.

“My mom took an afghan in and raked them all off the shelf,” Daniels said. “I had to put a lot of them back together. Can you imagine all of the little parts that came off?”

There are still a few pieces Daniels wants to add to her collection — large nutcrackers to set next to her fireplace, if only for the Christmas season.

But Saturday, she decided on a new nutcracker to look for.

“I need to find a hippie,” she said. “You just get tired of the little soldier men.”