Christmas pictures here!

[bjornolf]

Hey all, just thought I'd start a thread where we could put up pictures of our decorations, or ourselves, or our kids, decked out in our holiday finest. Here's my house:

[CathyCA]

OMG! You need more yard for your decorations!

I need to put up my decorations, but first I need to move boxes around to make room for the tree.

[Ima Facultiwyfe]

You sure got us started off with a BANG!!!! Verrrrry impressive big guy! Duke Power must be your friend!

Love, Ima

[DukeUsul]

Hey all, just thought I'd start a thread where we could put up pictures of our decorations, or ourselves, or our kids, decked out in our holiday finest. Here's my house:

Wow - you're a veritable Clark Griswold.

[shereec]

Hey all, just thought I'd start a thread where we could put up pictures of our decorations, or ourselves, or our kids, decked out in our holiday finest. Here's my house:

A+, my friend! You're exactly the kind of house we try to find on Christmas Eve. Our tradition is enjoying the displays others have set up, stopping by our friends' annual Christmas Eve open house, and coming home to fall asleep on the couch to "It's a Wonderful Life".

[DukeUsul]

We haven't done the exterior yet, but here's one of Katie in front of our tree.

[Very Duke Blue]

I love "Christmas Vacation". We watch it every year and laugh just as much or more than the last year.

[Very Duke Blue]

We haven't done the exterior yet, but here's one of Katie in front of our tree.

So sweet. Katie will really enjoy Christmas this year.

[Very Duke Blue]

Hey all, just thought I'd start a thread where we could put up pictures of our decorations, or ourselves, or our kids, decked out in our holiday finest. Here's my house:

Great, I know your children are enjoying "their house". I love Christmas decorations.

[bjornolf]

Katie looks so cute!

The annoying thing is that my wife won't let me get out on a ladder and put lights on the gutter up there (It's about 30 feet from the ground up there, and said ground is rather uneven). We have a decorating contest in our neighborhood, and I've never even sniffed so much as an honorable mention despite the "you can't win twice in a row" rule. All of the houses that win are shorter and their owners put lights on the gutters and even the roof. I'm afraid I don't stand a chance unless I risk life and limb to decorate my eaves. Ah well, my bitterness over the years has mostly given way to the joy I see in both my kids' eyes and the eyes of the neighborhood kids that gather almost every night to stare and make the Christmas trees play their awesome wailing guitar solos of Christmas caroles. I catch myself air guitarring along sometimes. ;)

[bjornolf]

The other thing that annoys the you know what out of me is that the neighborhood teenagers like to bust up my decorations. I used to put candy cane lights along the other side of the driveway, but the kids use my side yard as a path between houses to get to the street above and behind us, and they've busted those up pretty good, even cutting the wires once. I also had a flagpole with a Christmas flag over there, and they stole the flag and the flagpole. They also popped one of my airblowns once, and another time, one of them pulled up the stakes so one of the airblowns blew away in the heavy wind, leaving a path of destruction across my yard as the hanging stakes caught on other decorations or just rolled over them. It really bums me out every year when I come out and find damage. Ah well, 'tis life.

[CathyCA]

Katie looks so cute!

The annoying thing is that my wife won't let me get out on a ladder and put lights on the gutter up there (It's about 30 feet from the ground up there, and said ground is rather uneven). We have a decorating contest in our neighborhood, and I've never even sniffed so much as an honorable mention despite the "you can't win twice in a row" rule. All of the houses that win are shorter and their owners put lights on the gutters and even the roof. I'm afraid I don't stand a chance unless I risk life and limb to decorate my eaves. Ah well, my bitterness over the years has mostly given way to the joy I see in both my kids' eyes and the eyes of the neighborhood kids that gather almost every night to stare and make the Christmas trees play their awesome wailing guitar solos of Christmas caroles. I catch myself air guitarring along sometimes. ;)

Why don't you find a handyman and pay him to go up on the ladder for you? He could string the lights, and you could pretend that you live in California and leave the lights up on the gutter all year. No one in California takes their icicle lights down after Christmas. They just don't plug them in for another 10 months.

[Very Duke Blue]

The other thing that annoys the you know what out of me is that the neighborhood teenagers like to bust up my decorations. I used to put candy cane lights along the other side of the driveway, but the kids use my side yard as a path between houses to get to the street above and behind us, and they've busted those up pretty good, even cutting the wires once. I also had a flagpole with a Christmas flag over there, and they stole the flag and the flagpole. They also popped one of my airblowns once, and another time, one of them pulled up the stakes so one of the airblowns blew away in the heavy wind, leaving a path of destruction across my yard as the hanging stakes caught on other decorations or just rolled over them. It really bums me out every year when I come out and find damage. Ah well, 'tis life.

That is so mean. Could you put up a motion camera & cut it on after the normal traffic is done for the night?

[DukeUsul]

Well Joe, on behalf of Christmas decoration hooligans everywhere, I'll apologize. In my youth I was known for removing bulbs, moving decorations, and occasionally stealing Baby Jesus from manger scenes. I'm surprised I haven't had my comeuppance yet.... probably because my decorations are so meager compared to others.

[cl15876]

Hey all, just thought I'd start a thread where we could put up pictures of our decorations, or ourselves, or our kids, decked out in our holiday finest. Here's my house:

My goodness, you weren't kidding when you called! Nice JOB!!!! I'll bring the kids by so they can enjoy them also! I can't wait to hear the synchronized music as well!

[bjornolf]

Well Joe, on behalf of Christmas decoration hooligans everywhere, I'll apologize. In my youth I was known for removing bulbs, moving decorations, and occasionally stealing Baby Jesus from manger scenes. I'm surprised I haven't had my comeuppance yet.... probably because my decorations are so meager compared to others.

Yea, but did you ever break stuff and cut wires? I could deal with a pulled bulb and some moved decorations, though the stolen baby Jesus is pretty bad. One of my neighbors has those white wire frame reindeer, and somebody keeps making them mount each other. That, I think, is pretty hysterical.

[DukeUsul]

Well Joe, on behalf of Christmas decoration hooligans everywhere, I'll apologize. In my youth I was known for removing bulbs, moving decorations, and occasionally stealing Baby Jesus from manger scenes. I'm surprised I haven't had my comeuppance yet.... probably because my decorations are so meager compared to others.

Yea, but did you ever break stuff and cut wires? I could deal with a pulled bulb and some moved decorations, though the stolen baby Jesus is pretty bad. One of my neighbors has those white wire frame reindeer, and somebody keeps making them mount each other. That, I think, is pretty hysterical.

Yeah - stealing Baby Jesus wasn't my idea, I was just an accomplice. And it was from a friends house and we fessed up. So I don't think we're going to hell.

Yeah - my wife wants those reindeers, but I say no way, since you know they'll end up like that.

[CameronBornAndBred]

This was in an email sent to me today....

"Good news is that I truly out did myself this year with my Christmas decorations. The bad news is that I had to take him down after 2 days." I had more people come screaming up to my house than ever.Great stories. But two things made me take it down.

First, the cops advised me that it would cause traffic accidents as they almost wrecked when they drove by.

Second, a 55 year old lady grabbed the 75 pound ladder almost killed herself putting it against my house and didn't realize it was A dummy until she climbed to the top (she was not happy). By the way, she was one of many people who attempted to do that.

My yard couldn't take it either. I have more than a few tire tracks where people literally drove up my yard."

[captmojo]

This was in an email sent to me today....

xmasdummy.jpg

"Good news is that I truly out did myself this year with my Christmas decorations. The bad news is that I had to take him down after 2 days." I had more people come screaming up to my house than ever.Great stories. But two things made me take it down.

First, the cops advised me that it would cause traffic accidents as they almost wrecked when they drove by.

Second, a 55 year old lady grabbed the 75 pound ladder almost killed herself putting it against my house and didn't realize it was A dummy until she climbed to the top (she was not happy). By the way, she was one of many people who attempted to do that.

My yard couldn't take it either. I have more than a few tire tracks where people literally drove up my yard."

I love it!
I recently saw a dummy hanging backward from a center-front barn window somewhere. If I weren't trying to think of where it was, I'd have already spit it out.

[bjornolf]

Here's one of Michael at the school Christmas program yesterday.