When I was a child, my Dad would illuminate (read festoon),our house for the season with strings of lights. They went around the windows and doors, along the sun deck railings and of course along the eves of the roof.
We usually had the most lights of any house in the neighborhood and he topped the roof with a large blue Star that could be seen for miles. It was a bit excessive, but in the 70's, excess seemed to be the order of the day.

I don't have any on my house...never have, but some displays are truly tasteful and beautiful.
My next door neighbor did something different this year and it is really stunning. He has a medium sized plum tree in his front yard that stands a little off from his front door and he meticulously lined every branch with plain white lights. With the snow covered ground all around it, that plain tree has become breath takingly delicate and beautiful; resembling an enlarged version of a blown glass figurine.

How about you folks? Are there lights on your house or are there any stunning displays around where you live?

With love, Erika

Our street used to light up the neighborhood, when we were all young.
Now that we've aged into our 60s and 70s, we're lucky to get a wreath
on the door.. I do manage, with a little help from DD, get my little pre
-lit tree in the window, for me and my grands, and to cheer the neighbors.

I used to decorate the inside doors and mantle with lights and such,
but alas, no more.

We have done nothing this year as we will split holidays between 2 states. Don't want to leave a tree or lights or garlands up, while we are gone, for the cats to take down.>^..^<

ANN

Edited to add that I do have a double thumbed red amaryllis blooming. The 4 flowers on the first are out and in posistion- the second 4 are starting to open. It is fascinating how these flowers unpackage and arrange themselves!

I do have a few lights up. However even after all these years down here, not having snow, is weird at Christmas. That is one thing I do miss. The reflection of those lights off the snow. ginnie

Spray some snow on your shrubs..
We did that on our inside tree, when I was small.

We have absolutely no outdoor decorations this year. We barely decorated this year, with us celebrating on Thanksgiving weekend and then surgery the following week.
We don't even turn the tree on. As far as I'm concerned we can take it all down and put it away. Just not in the mood this year.

Although Christmas is one of my absolute favorite times of year if some one would look at my house from the outside they would think that the Grinch lives here. Our tree is down in the family room, we live in a bi-level. We don't do any decorating on the outside so no one can see any lights what so ever. My new bike sits right in front of the double window in the living room so there is no room for a tree. The living room is small enough it really isn't conducive to a tree anyway. I guess we did when we first moved here though because we didn't finish the family room until 1981 and we moved here in 1978.

I used to put light outside outlining my half of the duplex and the shrubs on front. My neighbor on the other side did the same. Now I just have a snowman hanging on my door. I have a pencil tree I decorate and lots of Santa's and snowman I put around the house.

I would have the bushes and trees in my front yard covered with lights if I could get out there to decorate. I used to always put lights up outside.

I also used to do a fancy, nearly designer, tree every year. Up until about two years ago, I did patriotic themed trees every year. (started doing that in 2001)

Always wanted a Christmas tree done up in patriotic colors, which is one of the big reasons I started doing that in 2001. There were so many patriotic themed ornaments that year. I bought a lot. Wish I'd put that tree up this year, instead of the lazy trees. (pre-lit, no decorations on one, other than a large ribbon bow at the top. The other is a fiber optic tree that came with it's own decorations built in)

I'm lucky enough that my hubby does the outside decorating. We have the house that the people in our town drive down our street just to see. Unfortunately though, a bunch of our decorations did not survive storage last year. We have to start buying new decorations to line our driveway. The inside is all decorated as usual though and my tree sits in front of the window. Although you can't see the tree from the street because the house in front of us blocks that window.

We have a landing strip on our roof for Santa. The first year we put it up a neighbor boy asked his mom if Santa would still be able to find their house since they didn't have one. She told him yes, the landing strip just got him to the neighborhood.

Now this year my hubby's hip was hurting so he wasn't going to decorate, but he had several people in the community ask him to put the lights (specifically the landing strip) up.