Watching Clark Griswold fail at hanging up Christmas lights in National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation may be a hilarious annual holiday tradition, but in real life, decorating failure is no laughing matter. According to the Consumer Product Safety Commission, around 15,000 people in the U.S. go to the emergency room every year for holiday decorating-related injuries. And no one is keeping statistics on the countless serious injuries my eyes suffer when I see neighbors with a half-ass light display. So let's avoid all that unpleasantness with this ultimate guide to Christmas lights, from planning, to tools, tips, safety, and storage.
Assess your space: Consider your roofline, windows, trees, shrubs, and walkways and decide what you're going to light up. Then develop an overall vision for your light display.
Choose a color scheme: A coherent look to your holiday lights is so important, I made a whole section about it below. Skip ahead if needed.
Decide on your lights: Do you want string lights, icicle lights, net lights, projectors?
Measure it: Now that you know what you're going for, it's time to measure. The first step to measuring is to throw away your old tape measures and get a laser. Here's a laser measurer for less than $30. Get something like this and you won't have to climb a ladder to know how long your roofline is.
Check your older lights: Part of planning is checking if the gear you already have is still working, so mix up some eggnog and make sure those old strings of lights still function.
Choose your color palette wisely
Pick a palette: The most obvious choice is red, green, and white, but consider other options like white, blue, and silver for a winter wonderland look, or red, white, and pink for candy cane vibes.
Be careful with the flair: If you're going to have lights that twinkle, chase, or change color, make sure it's part of an overall cohesive look. One flashing light amongst a bunch of static strings is not what you want.
They're cool: LED lights run at about half the heat of older style bulbs, so they are unlikely to set anything on fire, even if you try.
They use less energy: LEDs use about 10% of the energy that old school bulbs use.
They're versatile: LEDs can be super bright or subdued. You can get LEDs that change color, blink, simulate a meteor shower, and other special effects. You can get LED lights that are controlled from your phone and powered by batteries. They're just better.
Gather your supplies and tools
A decent ladder: Make sure your ladder is safe.
Extension cords
Here's some tips for actually hanging the lights:
Start at the power source: Always begin where your lights will plug in. Starting elsewhere is a Griswold move that will ruin Christmas. Work outward from the outlet so you don’t run out of cord length mid-roofline.
Use clips and hooks instead of nails: Nails can damage your house or even cause electrical fires, so don't nail anything. Bonus: Hooks make taking everything down in January much easier.
Wrap trees and shrubs neatly: For trees, start at the trunk and work outward. For small bushes, wrap in a spiral pattern from bottom to top.
How to remove and store Christmas lights
Reverse the installation: Do it all backwards. Remove lights starting from the farthest point from the outlet. Remove lights from trees from the outside-in and from the bottom up.
Label each strand: Denote where it went (roofline, bushes, tree, etc.) with a piece of masking tape and a Sharpie.
Store securely: Keep all your gear in a cool, dry place, in a plastic storage bin, so you can be ready for next year. Do not use cardboard boxes. Instead, get something like these Rubbermaid tubs.
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