2023, Family, holidays, home, Uncategorized

Lit Up

52 Comments

When we first moved to our house in 1988, people referred to our street, in December, as Santa Claus Lane because about four houses at the end of the street had elaborate, wooden, hand made, moving Christmas decorations in the front yard. One, the home of a piano teacher, had the swaying figure of an organist that looked like the teacher herself seated at a pipe organ, with choir boys standing along side in a row. The boys looked like the teacher’s three sons.

As the owners of the elaborate decorations aged and/or died, the decorations have been given to other residents on the street, but the decorations have aged, too, and no longer move. Most other residents opt for strings of lights on the trees and houses. All we have are four, year round LED lanterns stuck in the ground lining the edge of the front peony bed.

Our front yard isn’t conducive to light displays because of the awkward placement of the only electrical outlet on the front of the house being between the double garage doors. We would have to drive over electrical cords. I am fine with no lights. Something in me rebels about the falderal, and really, all that just takes up space in the basement 11 months of the year. Husband is even more ascetic than I am, but confessed last weekend while we were running errands to strange urges to get lights and hang the all over the front of the house. I don’t know what got into him, but I got him home as soon as I could and poured a glass of German brandy for him. that is something we usually only have around this time of year, since I need it for Stollen.

How do you decorate the outside of your house for the holidays? What is your favorite holiday beverage?

52 thoughts on “Lit Up”

  1. The only house we did much with was our place in Chicagoland that had a beautiful blue spruce in the front yard. It was a manageable size in our first year (7-8 feet tall), so I strung together 5 or six strands of lights and wrapped them around the tree. Unfortunately, the lights tended to short out, half a strand at a time, so most days it looked “splotchy.” By year five, the tree had grown a few feet, so I resorted to a crooked nail at the end of a wooden pole with which to drape the strand of lights over and wrap the light strand around the top few feet of the tree. LOTS of fun! Never solved the light failure problem, so we gave up on that idea, then moved to Owatonna.

    Here, my wife usually decorates a small pot on the front stoop with a small strand of lights, but she hasn’t even done that yet this year. She does put a strand around the large picture windows at the front of the house and centers a small, lit up artificial tree on a table in the window, but that’s all for outdoor decorations. Of course, some neighbors go hog wild with decorations. Inflatable Christmas characters seem to be all the rage, but outrageous displays of lights still dominate the landscape of the houses that do put up outdoor lights.

    It’s nice to look at, and gets us a bit in the mood, but an old geezer like me doesn’t need to be out stringing lights on the roof gutters or over the garage peak. Christmas is for kids anyway, and one less ostentatious display of wasted electricity won’t be noticed.

    Chris in Owatonna (fighting the urge to say, “Bah, humbug.” 🙂 )

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    2. Forgot to mention my favorite holiday beverage(s). It’s probably Champagne, but I never turn down Bailey’s Irish Cream on the rocks, hot cocoa with a splash of peppermint schnapps, or even egg nog with a bit of rum. Mimosa’s for a New Year’s day brunch are fun too. Better might be a Kir Royale.

      Do I sound like a lush??!?

      Chris

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  2. The lights are my favorite thing about the Christmas season. I know it’s ecologically unwise, but better now with LED, etc. I love driving at night in December.

    We finally joined the “lighters” when in Robbinsdale, and followed the rooflines with them for a few years, but it is a pain in the rear to get them up, esp. if you wait till cold weather. Now, in the front solarium (formerly a porch) I have a swag of lights inside the 7 windows which shows quite well from outside. I NEVER TAKE IT DOWN, so only have to plug it in.

    I think eggnog with brandy or sherry is nice, and I love things like wassail…

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  3. Rise and Blink Your Lights, Baboons!

    Not much Christmas decorating here. Over the weekend as we dug out our decorations, we found our pre-lit Christmas tree looks like Charlie Brown’s tree. The lights are out and the branches have lost much of the fake greenery. When we went shopping for a replacement we found that the supply was tapped out so we came home with a very small, fake, pre-lit tree that will do for this year. My wreath is up. A few Tchotsches are out. We did put out a new string of lights in the front. They blink. And that is it. Bah. HumBug.

    Favorite drink? Over the past few years we have gotten into the habit of having some knock-off Baileys Irish Creme after the Christmas meal. (Costco’s Kirkland brand Irish Creme–twice the volume for half the price of the real thing). It meets the need. We also go with my son and his wife to the Arboretum Christmas Light walk and have some following that to “warm our toes.”

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  4. I put up lights every year. Nothing too tasteful—a string of lights along the gutter and white lights scattered in the (artificial) pine garlands in the window box along the front of the house. The outlet for the lights is to the right side of the front steps and the window box is to the left so I have to run an extension cord up and along the gutter to get power to the window box without running a cord across the front sidewalk. Our small tree inside is visible from the street. There are lights around the main windows in the living room and a lighted garland in the front porch. Lately I’ve begun stringing colored lights along our back fence. The lights are all on timers so they go on every night without my attention.

    I eschew the inflatable figures or indeed any figures in the yard but there is a neighbor who has embraced those whole hog. In the morning when all the fans have been turned off for the night and all the figures have collapsed his yard looks like the scene of a Christmas massacre.

    The vibe I am seeking is more of a ‘50s or ‘60s look—just strings of colored lights arranged none too precisely. That feels nostalgic to me and epitomizes Christmas. Only 4 or 5 houses on our block bother to decorate at all. There is little enough to mark the turning of the season. Except when I am coming home after dark, I don’t really see my exterior lights. They are a gesture to the community.

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  5. Random recollection—
    When we lived in Golden Valley there were a couple of houses famous for their over-the-top holiday lights. They actually rented a cherry-picker to enable them to string lights on their massive pines.

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    1. That reminds me: When we lived in Roselle (Chicagoland) there was an entire street not far away dedicated to off-the chart Xmas decorations. It was quite possibly the most popular Christmas light viewing spot in the entire state.

      Cars were lined up for blocks to drive through. They made the street one-way for the evenings when the lights were on. EVERY SINGLE HOUSE in about a three block stretch was decorated to excess. The neighborhood happened to be under the western approach to O’Hare airport, and the legend was that the pilots could double check their flight path navigation by looking down at the light displays. Sheesh!

      We went once or twice, but it was such a zoo of people and cars, combined with sensory overload, that once or twice was more than enough.

      Chris

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  6. I tease Husband that if he really wants to decorate outside, I want a Santa Sleigh on the roof with a team of terriers pulling it and leaping up into the sky, with lights strung intricately through the grape vines on the pergola on the deck.

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  7. I like the lights too but I’m usually over it on December 26 and it all comes down. I think the lights are pretty and cheerful. I miss the old lights that made the electric meter spin though. These LEDs are cold-looking, even if you buy “warm white” ones.

    I found a used hula hoop at a thrift store and made a peace symbol out of it using older, multi-colored Christmas lights and copper wire. I used the wire to make the symbol around the hoop, then I wrapped it all in those old colored lights, using two strands. I put a piece of rope at the top and bottom, and repurposed some long, vinyl-covered twist ties to secure the sides and hold it all in place. I tie it to my balcony rail and secure it with more twisters and pieces of green rope. It can be seen from CR1. My judgy, passive-aggressive, 45-supporting neighbor gets to look at it every evening. I make sure it’s on so he can enjoy it. Happy, happy, joy, joy.

    I got the pre-lit Christmas tree out yesterday and set it up. It goes in the front patio door window and can be seen from CR1. I have a lot of hand-painted ornaments that were made by a friend of my mom’s in Wabasha, Kate Richardson. She has since passed away but I really loved her artwork and I have a ton of those beautiful ornaments. It all comes down right after Christmas, which I barely even celebrate anymore.

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    3. I also may have to try the hula hoop trick. I will have it face South towards the neighbor who is so bossy. However, most of our neighbors here are quite liberal. BUT, there IS a Green Bay Packer fan who puts out his Packer Backer flag on game days. It has created quite a stir.

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  8. Someday, a builder will get the great (?) idea of buildiing houses with pre-installed Christmas lights in the eaves and along the gutters that can be programmed and changed by computer so no one will ever have to climb ladders to put up Christmas lights . . . or Halloween lights . . . or July 4th lights/decorations . . . or Thanksgiving lights (yes, I’ve seen some!) . . . or [name your festive holiday].

    Chris

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    2. We’ve got color changing lights hanging from the gutters around our deck, and we change those monthly. Well, when we remember, and when the app works…

      I used to do lights around the house, but haven’t now for a lot of years. Christmas tree in the window will do nicely. No one see it but us.

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    3. My uncle did that in a planned community in Monticello. However, the big-box Christmas decor companies found him and the police found him a few weeks later in the truck of a crashed Toyota Camry

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  9. OT
    Doug from ND dropped out of the race for Republican Party nomination for President.
    Sadly, he never even rated a nickname from XXXpresident Donny. So much for being close to Minnesota Nice.

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  10. A friend I knew used to work as a contractor and was recently appointed to so-called ‘light up’ a Children’s Cancer Center in Milwaukee. According to the national broadcast, all of their Christmas spirits were released that night, along with his mugshot.

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  11. No specific holiday drinks. I did get my amish friendship bread out yesterday. Need some for the family Christmas on the 16th and it takes 10 days. Usually the first batch isn’t the best. But oh well. It’s family. 🙂

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  14. i tend to got nuts and cover the entire yard with snow. it is very festive and really adds to the holiday feel
    i am a tea drinker and for the holidays i make it earl gray

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  15. I make our hot chocolate mix – we make it massive quanities and keep in a huge tupperware. When we had friends over to trim the tree last week we had the following options for adorning your cocoa: marshmallows (vegan from Trader Joe’s), Baileys, Cool Whip, Redi-Whip and, of course, a big bowl of “real” whipped cream. Yum-O.

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  16. I have a couple of light-up candles, around three feet high, for the front steps. I haven’t gotten them out for a few years, but we have some warm weather coming up this week, so maybe I’ll dig them out. Other than that, a few rope lights and some white lights that are haphazardly hung and not comeletely functional. It’s the “done is better than perfect” approach.

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  17. I like to look at other people’s lights. There are a couple of places I can drive to within a few miles that are pretty remarkable. One area is shown in the video below. There is one house there that isn’t shown, though. The camera goes past it at around 2:20 into the video, in the circle at the end of the street, but it’s a little off camera and not lit up. The house has a large sign that says “JESUS”, which always makes me chuckle. It seems like it should say “JESUS IS BORN”, or something like that, but it just says “JESUS”. Make of it what you will. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXT53bE7hnk

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  18. No Christmas lights this year, so far. We’ve never had outdoor lights, but I usually put some fake candles in the windows of our porch. I wouldn’t dare put up real candles with our cat, Martha, around. The only thing that says Christmas so far is the cactus that started blooming a week ago.

    Favorite Christmas beverage is gløgg, but I rarely make it as husband doesn’t drink it. Maybe I should splurge on a quart of eggnog and a bottle of rum and see if that will boost my Christmas spirit.

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