Happy Thursday, friends! We have been keeping our precious grandson for the past week so I haven’t been here much at all. (And I wouldn’t change a thing!) However, my husband was busy last week hanging our new icicle lights on the front of the house. Come check them out!
We haven’t hung exterior lights in YEARS! I always decorate the front of the house and garage with wreaths and bows and a few lights, and that’s about it. But this year we decided to kick it up a notch and add icicle lights. So, here’s how they look!
And the view from around the front door. The lights turned out so pretty, but we learned a few things by hanging them so I thought I”d share a few tips!
So, here are a few tips!
*We used a brand of icicle lights made by “Holiday Time” purchased from Walmart. The package of 300 clear icicle lights were around $9 per box and are approximately 19 feet worth of lights. We bought 10 boxes, but ended up only using 8. Better to have too many than too few, right?
*Make sure the lights and the wire are the same color in each box you purchase. Some lights come with green wire and some white. Ours are clear lights and white wire.
*Because the lights do not come with a way to attach the lights to the gutters, you need to buy all-purpose light holders which attach to your gutters. A box of 100 was only around $6 at Lowe’s. (If you need to attach lights to brick, they do sell brick hooks. Or you can use command strips to attach to other surfaces.)
*Plug in the lights to make sure they all work before you hang them. There is nothing more frustrating than hanging a bunch of lights only to plug them in later and they not work.
*Make sure you know where you plan to plug in the lights once they are all hung and make sure you end with a “Male” outlet plug.
*The lights come in several sections of lights bound tightly together with twist ties. When you undo each section, you have to stretch out the lights so the “icicles” hang down nicely.
*You can only connect 3 sets of the exact same sets of lights together. Otherwise you will blow a fuse. (And we know this for a fact.) Use extension cords every 3 strands of lights and plug them into separate outlets. (We ended up pulling one of the extension cords through the garage window and plugging it inside as an extra outlet.)
*Space the clips every couple of feet so the lights will hang nicely.
*You can “unplug” certain sections of the lights on the strand if you come to the end or somewhere you don’t want lights. All you need to do is pull out one of the light bulbs and it will disable that section of the lights.
And there you have it! Just please be careful if you are hanging lights yourself. My husband used several different size ladders and some of the peaks were a bit precarious. Thankfully all went well and the lights look great!
My husband hung them just in time for us to keep our little grandson for a few days, and he loved looking at all of the lights on our house. He insisted we take the golf cart out at least once a day to go see the other lights and decorations in our neighborhood. (Here’s a better look at the front porch.)
So, tell me, are you ready for Christmas? I am tracking a few packages that haven’t arrived yet and I”m getting nervous! I may need to actually go Christmas shopping at a mall. Yikes, I haven’t done that in ages! Thank you for stopping by today and be sure to check out more of my Christmas decor on Instagram or Facebook! Love and hugs sweet friends! xoxo Dell
