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It all began over the Christmas of 1996. I'd seen Chevy Chase's "Christmas Vacation' for about the 80th time, and my parents and I had just returned home from our annual drive to Richmond to take the Tacky Light Tour of all the houses in Richmond decked out in lights. I was 12 years old. And I decided I wanted my own tacky light display.

I started with 6 or 7 old 100-light strands that were left over and unused from the family Christmas tree. The platform: the waterfront side of the house. I did the balcony & door, living room window, and some really crappy looking stuff on the deck railing. With Dad's assistance (he lends a hand every year), I ventured onto the roof and outlined it with a set of lights in motion, and used 2 sets of C7 lights to attempt to spell out "NOEL". I was one happy 12 year old.

Mom and Dad were just as excited I was. They probably thought it was going to be a one year thing.

Boy were they wrong.

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In 1997 I actually spent MONEY on Christmas lights. What the heck was I thinking? The display grew to approximately 1,300 lights, as I actually did all of the roofline this time, and lights draped all of the windows on the waterfront side of the house.

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The 1998 display wasn't all that different than the 1997 display, it was just brighter. I thickened up the lights everywhere they were before, and added a few specialty sets to various locations, but overall, it was laid out pretty much the same as before. 

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In 1999, the display approached 5,000 lights, and for the first time, I used things other than the house to hang lights from. The dogwood tree (see 2003), tree house, and an old 12-foot skiff with a piece of PVC stuck in the middle for a mast became props for the display.

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By the 2000 season, my family had come to love my displays as much as I did. You can really tell this when you start getting Christmas lights for your birthday. There was also a wedding held in our yard that summer, and the family friend who's wedding it was gave me the more than 5,000 white lights used to decorate it. The final total for the display was 12,568 lights. This was the first year that I made paths all throughout the yard, and even down onto the dock. The bushes on the bank overlooking the creek were lit up, as well as pretty much everything else I could get an extension cord to.

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2001 was an expansion of the 2000 display. Nearly everything was done the same with minor exception. There were additions. The display changed the pine tree on the hill to a virtual 12ft pvc tree (the pine tree grew too much to do without a cherry picker...) A waterfall was added coming down beside it. Pine trees in the woods to the west were illuminated with tree wrap, and other things were added in the woods to help eliminate the "dark spots" that were there. The dogwood had more lights than ever - 1200. Lights were added all over, the path was extended around the side of the house and towards the front, and an entrance was made by the arbor being illuminated in whites. Oh yea, by the way, if you were to take all the strands of lights and extension cords used in this display, they'd stretch for over 2 miles.

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15,568 Lights & 1.6 miles of wire - This was my first venture into "Public View" as I went out into town and decked out Dad's office. It was a great success - everything was on light sensors so they came on by themselves at dusk and turned off by themselves too! 

Oh, and I wouldn't have blown that many breakers in 02 if I had figured out sooner that one of the 20 amp circuits I was plugged into was the same as the well pump... it was a really strange coincidence that 1/3 of the display would go out if someone flushed the toilet...

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2003 marked the first year I was away from home at college. Being in Atlanta, 10 hours from home, really put a damper on being able to do a Christmas light display. So I told my parents, and they rightfully concurred, that I should just take the year off.

One night, around the 18th or 19th or so of December, they went out to eat and make a Wal-Mart run. I got left at home. Their mistake. I got bored. I went into the basement, pulled out 3,000 lights and a couple of blowmolds, ran an extension cord and lit the heck out of the dogwood tree in the back yard. It was absolutely awesome - that tree shined magnificently.

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In 2004, I returned to Virginia for college, and my light display returned to town - this time with over 32,500 lights!

The most noticable additions were in the field. First, the display stretched the entire length of the field, with a dozen PVC trees creating the first "forest" of lights. The other major addition was the 20' Megatree, which itself boasted more than 3,000 lights. The boat was returned to it's pond of lights, and a "river" of lights was added to flow into it. Numerous figures, a lighted arch, and a lightup train were added as well.

This was also the first year we had to "borrow" power from next door. J&W Seafood, as they have in each year since, let us run a cord over to a 20amp outlet to help us power the display.

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While 2005 was meant to be the biggest display Deltaville had ever seen, with computer controlled animation and music, and almost 50,000 lights, time limits and a few other setbacks caused that to be backed off of.. However, 24,000 lights did make it up!

A similar, but redesigned display from '04, the field featured the 20' green mega tree, flanked on either side by 4- 10' trees and a 5' tree, for a total of 11 PVC-pipe trees in all. The seesaw, frosty in the arch, penguins, and boat all came back for '05, as did the basic design for the building, with lights on the roof, bushes, and columns.

Despite the computer control setback, a successful test of Nat King Cole's "Happiest Christmas Tree" was sequenced, and displayed for one night on the Mega Tree.

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OH NO!!!

2006 was a sad year for the display. Due to school/work/misc. time constraints, there was no display of any kind for the first time since I started doing displays in 1996. It was a sad sight seeing a dark office during Chistmas.... soo I made sure 2007 wouldn't suffer the same fate...

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 I was back in 2007, and to make up for the lack of a display on '06, expansion was nuts! We literally had to re-wire new circuits into the office, and again ran a 20 amp line from J&W just to power the more than 52,000 lights!

The forest was bigger than ever, with 15 individual PVC trees. In addition to the 20' Mega Tree, a pair of 15' semi-mega tree's were added to set apart from the mass of 10' trees.

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2008 was a slight expansion and reconfiguration of the 2007 display. With more "trees" in the "forest" than ever before, the display looked amazing!