My daughter insisted on decorating the house and yard early this year. She recruited her boyfriend into lugging everything down from the attic and setting everything up on the lawn the day before Thanksgiving, then got everyone in on rigging up the lights on the house the day after Thanksgiving. She was determined to do the full-on Christmas thing this year, since we didn’t really do Christmas last year. It was the first year without my husband, who passed away that summer, and I just couldn’t bring myself to go through all the holiday rituals without him.
This is the earliest we’ve ever gotten everthing going, and it looks like we’re the first in our subdivision to decorate. My goal has always been to have the tackiest house in the neighborhood, and I think I’ve almost reached my goal. I’ve spent years shopping on the day after Christmas so I can get all of my illuminated deer, Santas, snowmen, and lights at half-off prices, and I now boast quite a collection.
Even though my electric bill will be staggering this month, I’m glad my daughter nudged me along and got everything going for me. I’m not sure if I would have done it this year either, but now that it’s done, I find myself looking forward to Christmas again. And yes, I’m thinking I still need to buy more stuff!
Our neighborhood is filing out nicely. A few folks went up 2 weekends ago, more last weekend and we’re doingours yesterday & today. We normally get about 75% of the houses doing something and we’re at ~50% coverage now.
I vote you react by ranting about the tacky consumerism embodied in these Christmas lights. That way you get to feel superior with your small, tasteful display.
I hate the TSO. I think I hate it more every year.
Unfortunately, I am unable to hang lights up outside. In not by on Christmas, but my fiancée is so I wanted to surprise her with lights, but there are no electrical outlets. I am going to put a inch of lights in our room and on the balcony. I just love blue and white lights.
I put ours up around mid- to late October, as we’re likely to have cold enough weather that the roof will be too slippery to safely do the ones around the eaves after that, but I normally don’t turn them on until December. Turned most of them on this evening though, just to welcome the wife back from picking up her sister.
I live in Denver. If you don’t get 'em up by Thanksgiving, The odds are too good that you’re going to have to spend some time balancing your ladder on a glacier. Not my bag, baby. Got mine up the weekend before Turkey Day. But tried to keep them off until T-Day Night.
You typically only get a couple days in January when the glacier issue abates enough to take them down safely, If you miss it, they’re up 'til St. Patty’s Day.
A bunch of my neighbors did Halloween lights this year. No shit! I put out my jack-o-lanterns, that’s the best I could do.
There are two brothers who live across the street and 5 doors down. They always have a huge gaudy display, which goes up the weekend of Thanksgiving. I think they add 1 new thing every year - I like it.
But the other neighbors have started ramping up their Christmas lights. Their houses look pretty good. Nothing with choreographed sound or anything but still it makes my house look bleak.
I don’t have an accessible outdoor plug nor do I have an extension ladder nor do I really care about putting lights up. Even my big picture window seems like too much of a pain to string lights around, on the inside. I am just too lazy for Christmas lights.
But, I put my lowly little 24" pre-lit Christmas tree in the window every year, with my 10 ornaments, and that serves as my “lights.” Of course, I haven’t bothered to do that yet…I am desperately waiting for snow!
Saturday I did the ‘wrap the large tree round from trunk to tip’ with two big Live Oaks in my front yard, resulting in something very similar to this only in white. I probably used 30 strings and it took several hours but gotta admit it looks really cool.
We have two sets of decorations. Both go up at the same time.
This year we will again have six Christmas trees. The live tree is going up in the family room tonight. It will have LED multi-colored lights and Christmas decorations. The entire room will be “Christmas.” The living room already has the large artificial tree, with cool white LED lights, decorated only with snowmen. Going up the stairs are four tiny trees, only with decorations (no lights). The cats love these. They like to hide behind them and knock them over.
The Christmas decorations (trees, etc.) remain up until the day after Christmas when they must come down (wife’s family tradition and etiquette). What remains are the winter decorations … snowmen. My wife is up to more than 500 of them now. Crystal, metal, resin, handmade, fabric, etc. From an inch high to a foot or more.
Outside, just a few LED icicle lights hanging under an LED rope light. The simplicity of the outside offers no clues as to the winter wonderland inside. The snowmen remain up until February 1st when they all come down, to be replaced with Valentines Day stuff.
Of course, you didn’t ask about the other major holidays …
NO. Not in Canada anyways, for this way madness lies (our Thanksgiving is in mid-October). It’s bad enough the retailers making Christmas displays appear one nanosecond after midnight on November 1. Lights should be during December only.
I lived in a sector of Oakville where Christmas lights were on the verge of becoming a comptitive sport. I would’t be surprised to find that the airport was issuing special Notices to Airmen to ensure that befuddled pilots weren’t bringing their 747s down on Upper Middle Road.
Pshaw. My lights come on November 1st. That, to me, is the start of the Canadian Christmas season, and I like being festive, and if’n you don’t like it, you can kiss my big fat mistletoe.
However, those who leave their lights up much past January are just gettin’ lazy. I’ve seen people around my area leave their lights up 'til March or even April, which is just getting ridiculous.
I haven’t seen a Christmas light or decoration yet in my neighborhood. I have a Charlie Brown Christmas Tree (literally, complete with red ornament and Linus’ blanket) and a manger scene at my desk, and our front lobby has the tree up. But that’s all I’ve seen so far.
