Light Them Up
With December just around the corner, neighbourhoods are lighting up across the nation. Our tradition for our family is usually to light up the outdoor lights on American Thanksgiving. I flipped the lights on last Wednesday. I have noticed that a lot of people were working on their lights this past week and this weekend. With a freshly fallen snow forecasted for tomorrow across many parts of the Greater Toronto Area, the city will be aglow tonight has neighbours Light Them Up. Today is officially the launch of Toronto’s Calvacade of Lights. The heart of the city will be bright.
One of my most favourite tasks of the holiday season is to put the lights up on the trees outside. In recent years the task has become quite enjoyable. Our extended autumn delivers fairly mild weather for stringing the lights. One custom that I have adopted is to place the lights on the outdoor trees the weekend of the Toronto Santa Claus Parade. I maintained that tradition this year, the day of the parade. Even this year, although the Toronto parade will be aired “virtually” on December 4th, I chose the traditional November weekend to hang and test the lights.
Neil Pasricha’s reference to this task is on page 7 of his “Book of (Holiday) Awesome” . He refers to the awesomeness being the fact that you are “plugging in your Christmas lights from last year and having them all work”. I must admit that up until two years ago, this was always an issue for me. I was a late convert to the new LED light systems. The original old-style lights were far more fragile and breakable than the new LED versions. The LED versions are also much easier to string and remove for storage as well. They are also getting more brilliant as the years pass by.
I am sure that I will still be faced with the surprise of half strings undone when I go to light up the indoor lights. I still have lights from many years of adding strings to the indoor tree. Hey! Maybe this year is the year that we should finally make the transition to LED lights for the indoor tree as well. (NOT) Has anyone made this transition and have feedback on that front? Does the tree glisten with the new as well as the old light systems?
I hope friends were able to string lights prior to today. Snow and freezing rain tomorrow could be a challenge for sure. The rule in our household, as dictated by my dearly beloved sweetheart wife, is that the lights are allowed to be turned on the day that our neighbours to the south celebrate American Thanksgiving. Thus, Thursday, November 26th was the tree lighting at the Devins.
I’m going to place some lights on a little maple tree in the parkette outside our front window. Several neighbours joined with me last year in decorating other trees in the public park. It was a wonderful sign of the spirit of Christmas.
Wishing you all well in your plans for tree lighting this Christmas season. Ho Ho Ho.
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