Diary of Christmas Lights

1990 – While we lived in Houston I decided to tackle the job of putting Christmas lights on the house with the help of the kids. We had never put lights up before so this was to be a mementos occasion.

The night before the kids had trouble sleeping with the anticipation of putting up the lights. The next morning the kids ran to the garage, got out the ladder and extension cords while I retrieved the strings of lights from the house. We all met in the front yard with great excitement.

I moved the ladder to the front of the house and as I ascended the ladder with stapler in hand, the kids were on the ground plugging the lights end to end. As I began to staple the sting of lights to the house everything was going exceptionally well. When I finished stapling the last few feet of lights to the eaves of the house I stepped off the ladder to survey our job. The kids and I were pleased and Morgan ran to plug in the lights…..the string of lights were 3 feet short of reaching the outlet.

1991 – This year was going to be different. The kids and I had 1 year experience under our belts and we were ready to tackle the ‘Christmas lights on the house’ project.

Once again excitement began to mount as we pulled the ladder, extension cords and lights out of the garage. This time we plugged the lights into the outlet before we started putting up the lights. We were on our toes!

Things were going great except for an occasional shock I received when a staple would go into the wire instead of on the outside of the wire. The lights looked great!

1992 – This year Daryl decided to put in his two cents. He informed me that I had been doing it wrong for the past 2 years, duh! Once again the kids and I drug the ladder, extension cords and lights out of the garage. This time we had a bucket and a new staple gun in hand, the old stapler didn’t withstand the ‘shock’ of last Christmas.

The kids and I sat of the ground and began to remove each bulb from its socket and gently place them in the bucket, thanks to Daryl’s two cents. He had informed me that hanging lights from the eaves of the house with the access lights streaming down and hitting on the driveway was a sure fire way to break a few the bulbs.

Once again I climbed the ladder and the kids and I hung the string of lights minus the bulbs. When we finished we pulled the ladder around to the front of the house and this time when I ascended the ladder, I had a bucket full of bulbs in hand.

I would choose a different color bulb and carefully place it in the socket and screw it in. Things were going great, even if it did take us an extra 2 hours this year to put up the lights. As I reached for another bulb, my hand caught the bucket and it fell 7 feet to the driveway, glass splattered everywhere. I was afraid to look at the kids faces as I stood on the ladder with mouth gaping. As I slowly looked around I noticed a crowd of neighbors had gathered on the lawn. Several rushed forward to help clean up the mess, when someone piped up, “We love to watch you; you do such exciting things.”

1993 – This year we decided to forgo Christmas lights.

Colossians 3:23 “Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for men.”