Christmas Decorations To The Extreme

I used to "Christmas" like nobody's business waaaaayyyy back in the good old days of yesteryear. Christmas changed significantly after Mom and Dad passed away and then after I landed here in Cincinnati...even more dramatic/drastic changes occurred affecting the way I celebrate the holiday.

I used to have a beautiful tree, meticulously trimmed with myriad ornaments I had collected over the years. Now, in my matchbook-sized apartment, there is no tree...haven't had one since 1999. In addition to the tree, there were the "special" Christmas bears, music boxes, Department 56 Dickens Christmas Village, and other decorations strewn about the house. It was homey, comfy. My favorite thing to do was turn out all the lights and watch TV by the glow of the Christmas tree lights. Ah, those were the days.

Don't get me wrong, I still have a few special things I put out in an effort to summon the old Christmas feeling. Nowadays, though, instead of a 7' tree, I have an 18-inch Boyds Bear tree and a Nativity crafted by the Danbury Mint. I still have a few Christmas Bears and a couple of smaller battery operated Boyds trees. The upside is, now it takes me an hour or two at the most to get everything out and in place whereas it took three or four days to do the decorating in the past.

But, I have to admit that, even in my glory days, I never contrived to create the sort of outdoor, over-the-top, extravaganzas that many people undertake these days. I kept it very simple in that area; i.e., some garland and a few strands of clear lights woven around and through the front porch banister, a tasteful wreath, and that was about all I could muster.

That is lame and tame compared to the video I chose to highlight in this post. Actually, this display is from 2005 and is on a house in Mason, Ohio, which is about 20 miles...give or take...north of Cincinnati. It was highlighted on the local news and, later, on a Miller Lite commercial. The guy who did this is an electrical engineer, and it took him two months at a cost of $10,000 to hook up the 25,000 lights. (Eat your heart out, Clark Griswold.)

Actually, it's pretty cool, and has a really big finale, but I wouldn't want to live next door to the guy. Enjoy and Merry Christmas!



Well, the vid I originally used was taken down by YouTube, but I found another posted by houseofboyd.