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1-29-12 - I just noticed my last few posts had the wrong date! The were marked for November. Can't be, the display in not DOWN from 2011 yet! Pictures of the display for 2011 have been posted to the website and Facebook. The HDR technique worked pretty well for my first time. Hopefully I will get more chances to work with that during the year to get better results next season. The Display tear down has been mostly halted. Mother Nature bit real hard with all the snow, wind and rain. We had some landscape damage, a Blooming Cherry Tree out on 236th Ave, and one of our Cedar Trees right out the back slider were damaged with the weather. We will see how they survive in the spring. I was out of town on a business trip this week, and then the house fix it stuff and a new furniture addition eat into this weekend. Tracy ordered a new entertainment unit for the upstairs Great Room. I had to get a friend and some relatives to help me pick it up and get it moved upstairs. This thing is huge. 4 pieces, 2 of which were close to 250 pounds each. Trying to maneuver it all upstairs was no easy feat, then we had to get it set up. This thing came packed like you would not believe. So I had a trailer full of cardboard, styrofoam, and wood. WAY too much for the garbage. Casey our Handyman also finished the Laundry Room on Saturday, so there was a bunch of stuff there to get rid of as well. So I took a load to the dump. Today, I had to get the Laundry Room sink squared away, get the washer/dryer back in and hooked up, then Tracy wanted me to make a Costco run. Needless to say the sink had it's problems, but I finally got it all squared away with no leaks, and, I got some laundry going as well, since the washer/dryer has been disconnected for almost 2 weeks! So if you have not deduced from all this, no work was done on the display tear down this weekend. I have a few night this week to get a few things done, then next weekend, Superbowl weekend, Tracy and I will be in L.A. visiting my Mom. We leave Thursday. I have to get her taxes stuff done, and we will just visit with her. Everyone is looking forward to the trip. Soooo, this year will be a late tear down. Fortunately, we don't go to Mazatlan for our Winter vacation until the first part of March. There is at least 5-6 solid days of work to get the rest of the stuff down and put away. I had to put in an LED light order, and was working on the new RGB Tree stuff, but all that is temporarily halted since there is a lot going on at the moment. Oh yeah, we had a very late Thank You note from one of our visitors. One of the buses that showed up from what I gathered by the written note. They also included a $50 check toward SOWA! So that brings our 2011 season total to $6060! I just mailed it off to SOWA today. I love getting those Thank You notes from our visitors. Well that is all for now. Check back in a few weeks to see what other updates I have for you all.

1-19-12 - WOW! Snowmagedden! The Seattle area is getting pelted with severe winter weather. Snow, ice, wind, all not good on their own, let alone TOGETHER! We lost power last night for 5 hours, only to find out that our generator is non-functional. The engine fires up, but no AC power. I had a little 2250W backup, but I just loaned it to my stepson Cameron on Tuesday in case HE lost power at his new home in Duvall. Well funny how those things work out. I was not going to drive out there unless I HAD to. So fortunately, my neighbor had a 2000W camper generator that he let me use to keep the fridges and a light or 2 powered. We will have more outages before this is over for sure. We had an ice storm this morning, and wind is on the docket for Saturday. The temp is staying below freezing, so none of this is going away soon, or soon enough! I did HAVE to get 2 vignettes from the display out of the yard that have the potential to be damaged in the snow, ice and wind. They are now drying in the garage. I need to spend some time this evening putting some stuff away to clear out the garage a bit. Tracy in NOT happy that her baby is parked in the driveway getting all buried in snow. My only concern is the Mega Tree. It is a PVC frame. I was able to reduce as much weight as possible off the top by removing the strobes, Mega Star, and Mega Balls. Now I just have to keep the snow off the top and lights. That helps with any wind we may get. So Tear Down is stalled for now. I can probably get porch stuff taken down, but have too many other issues to deal with at the moment. So Mom Nature is making up for that WONDERFUL December she gave us. I am almost finished with the 2011 picture edits and they should be posted tonight if I have a chance, and don't lose power!

1-15-12 - OK so time to take the New Year picture off the Front Page of the site. I have for the first time had something stolen from the display. My Christmas Street sign. Along with that, they took a "This Property is under video surveillance" sign as well. Pretty trivial overall, but one has a tendency to read more into this, especially with our one or 2 problem neighbors back behind us. I will let the Junior High and Grade School kids know (both bus stops are at our house) that there is a reward if someone can recover the signs and let me know who took them. I will ensure the right attention gets brought to this matter. I hope this subtly lets them know that I will not tolerate vandalism or theft. So we got SNOW! yesterday and today. The Tear Down is in progress, not going fast, and now with the weather it will be hindered as well. Plus, we are starting to do a Laundry Room remodel. Which means that I have some things to focus on with that effort, even though we have Casey doing the actual work, I will still have to do the trim painting. I almost have my numbers for my LED light order. It will be mainly only Warm White LEDs to accomodate the new Chase Trees that will be in the yard next year. I am still looking into RGB hardware a bit and making some inquiries on Pixel strings, but a lot won't happen on that until I get the display down and away. One more load to go under the house and all the stuff that goes there will be put away. The yard is slowly looking bare.

1-11-12 - This time of year, right after the Holiday's, it is nice to relax a bit, and I do. Some are hell bent on getting their displays down. While I do want to get it down, basically from Oct 1st, it was a 3 month sprint to set up the display, get it updated on the computer, lit up, executed and then shut off. There is literally almost not a down moment I get in 90 days. So I take it somewhat easy the first few days of the New Year. I watch the College Bowl games, I finish up what I have to on the inside of the house, and I do get kicking a bit on the outside display. This past weekend, I got a fair amount done. The control, communications, and theatrical lighting came out of the yard on Saturday dried and put away. I got the tough half of the roof done Sunday, and the rest of the controllers and communications that were up there. So far this week, the blow molds, and wood cutouts came out of the yard, except Sally, the Peanuts Nativity Angel is still on her pole. She will come down next. All that has to be put away, then we start the get the next items out of the yard and into the garage to dry. While it may not sound like it, I have taken it pretty easy, plus, I am also back at work, and starting to get things planned and moving there. Planning has already started on the display for next year. I really, really want to do an RGB Tree. I will either replace one tree, or add a 4th, I am not sure yet. An RGB Tree takes the regular mini lights and replaces them with individually programmable light pixels So think about 1600 individual lights on a tree that I can control. Something on this scale would allow me to run words or even put pictures or video on the tree. I have been looking at this technology for 2 years now, and started to get some in this year with the new RGB Balls in the Spiral and Mega Trees. I realized one of my light vendors moved their order date UP to Jan 20th this year instead of in February. So that means that I have to figure out what I need. This accounts for replenishing spares, to the new display items I want to add. I need to carve out some time this weekend to see where I am at for this effort. While the timing sucks, it is the cheapest I can get lights all year so this has to be my big order for the year. Tracy and I are having a friend of our neighbors, Bob and Marti across the street, do some handy man stuff around the house. Some of the local Light Crazy Gang, who plans our Christmas Light get together wanted to get our date set, and some planning done as well. So we have finalize that date to be May 12th, and started to rough in a subject matter agenda. It should be a great meeting, it always is. March 1st marks 15 years in our house. While the stuff being done, I can do, there is a time factor that I don't always have. So some window sills on the south side of the house are being replaced, some interior doors worked on so they close properly, the front door is being fixed and I will repaint. Then the big overhaul is the laundry room. Tracy wants to put stone on the floor over the linoleum we originally put in, a new granite counter top to match, and a fresh coat of paint on those walls. I will replace and repaint the molding, and repaint the new sills. Some of the doors upstairs need sanding and repainting as well. Outside the yard badly needs a renovation, so I am looking into how best to handle that. The top soil has all compacted, and we have some very soggy parts of the yard. We could put some drainage in to assist with that in some areas, but I need to put sand down everywhere Then there is our family vacation in March I get to look forward to. So, WOW!, this started out to be a quick update. Looks like a lot to report in the past week eh? Thanks for checking in. Oh and one more thing. Tracy and I will be heading to my Mom's in L.A. for Superbowl weekend. We want to spend some time with her, and I have to get her taxes done for the year. Happy New Year! We're off and running.

1-4-12 - Well, "Woodinville Wonderland Inside" to coin a famous phrase, is almost all down. Tracy went at it yesterday. The only significant remnant is the famous "Inside Tree". Tracy wants to keep that up a few more days to enjoy it, and it helps with my picture effort outside. I started to get some pictures last night, but true to form, and the norm for this time of year, Mom Nature wanted to "rain on my parade". It poured, and we had some gusty winds to boot. It finally let up about 9pm enough to get out for about 45 minutes. I got some pictures of our neighbors and our display. I like the effects of the HDR Photography technique. The software I have allows me to select pre-defined looks, or I can tweak them myself. So to continue to get more pictures, I need to fix a few things outside, and will hope the weather stays clears enough to capture all my pictures tonight. That means I will be hauling the BIG ladder around to get some good angles on the display. I also modified my photo sequence to get some contrasting elements in the pictures as well. Tear Down commences right after I get the photos done that I need. First up will be to disconnect power in the yard, remove the temporary "Santa Power", my 80amp sub panel. Then get the hardware/controllers out of the yard. I stopped by Mclendon's to get a large box fan for the garage to circulate the air to assist with drying everything. To manage my display efforts, I have 2 computers that are used. The large desk side, what is called the Light Master, and the laptop that is called the Show Master are getting cleaned up, backed up, and updated as well. During the season, ALL updates get turned off so as to preserve the "Show" environment. Once things get dialed in for the display season, I want as little that can go wrong in the picture. So now they are in need of some attention to keep them humming. It is also part of my end of year, closing out of 2011 and getting ready for 2012. That's all for now, keep checking back.

1-1-12 - Closing Night. WOW! 2011 was a fabulous season, and Closing Night is always one of the most mixed emotion days of the year. So much goes into 4 weeks of effort. Those 4 weeks are cherished and exhausting. Mom Nature gave us the most incredible viewing season we have ever had. Our visitation was way up. The warmth, support, accolades, expressions of gratitude were just overwhelming at times, but always appreciated and gives us inspiration. Our donations to SOWA and the Northshore Wranglers was OUTSTANDING. We can't thanks everyone enough for supporting that effort. Tonight we were quite busy for the last night of the display, and to accommodate some new friends, I actually extended the shut down to almost 9:45pm, but alas, the end always has to come. I was able to do a walk around to get some notes on what worked well and what didn't. I had a visit by one of my close buddies and fellow Light Crazy, Kevin (Wirekat) Thomas, as well as Sharon and Dallas Graham of Garden D'Lights in Bellevue. There are no real plans for tomorrow except pictures. I am also back to work as well! I had our New Years Holiday last week. As much as I always kid myself about video, I think I won't even attempt to get that this year. Pictures for the website will be sufficient, as I am going to try to use the HDR photography technique, so we will see how they turn out. I have ideas and plans swimming around my head for next year already, and will have to spend some time "penning" them into my notes and see how they will affect a LED light order that always has to be submitted by the end of February. Tear Down will start as soon as I feel the pictures are sufficient, and needless to say, by this coming weekend we will be fully immersed in getting things down as quickly as we can. Just a quick update, check back and I will provide some additional thoughts and insights.

12-31-11 - Happy New Years Eve! Another year has come and gone. I know they say as you get older, they shift to light speed, and, oh man are they right. This time of year, it is always very HECTIC for me and Tracy. We love the season, the visiting, laughing, celebrating, joy and all else that goes with this time of year. Our passion, the display, and I truly mean our display, inside and out, is a marvel. For friends and relatives that get to see the inside, you see the other half that Tracy creates. We love the fact we can share like this with new/old friends and family. So where am I going with all this? Today, I always sit quietly somewhere, and ponder the blessings we have. We are able to do a display like we do, and many, MANY facets go into that. Tracy and I have so much to be THANKFUL for. I am just glad others will seek us out this time of year, and allow us to share with them, our expressions of the season. I have been very lucky in life. Could it be better, maybe, but not much. Could it be worse, you bet, but no matter what, life is what it is, and, what you make it. As long as I live, I will always be an optimist, because, everything will always get, or be better, somehow. Now, that is not stated with rose colored glasses, I am also a realist as well, I just choose to look at things differently. So as we "kick 2011 in the ass", on the way out, we welcome Baby New Year tomorrow, and look forward to the paths and challenges it will hold for all of us. Maybe too deep for a Display Blog, but it is what is in my heart and I get to share it. Happy New Year! to each and everyone of you. Thank you! for all the love, help and support you give to us throughout the year(s).

12-26-11 - What a couple days! On Christmas Day, Mom Nature decided to take a bit back after the stellar weather we have had. The wind "blew a Hoolie" as I am told the expression is in the UK. Knocked power out for 8 hours. Issues was, we were hosting the family Christmas festivities. While we are used to power outages, and have back up generators, they don't power the entire house, nor the display. All in all, the day was hectic, but manageable. The power finally came on about 8:15pm and it took a while to figure out where the plugs were moved on the house network. I have switched plugs that get run through the network and electrical wiring in the house. Which meant that the network needed to be up too. It took about 15 minutes and we off and running about 8:30. Our current SOWA donation totals are astounding. $5140. I am blown away by that. The generosity of our guests is amazing. We broke last years total ($4600) with another week of the display. Today is some down time. The display needs pictures, and one string of lights on the Light Fan needs looking at, but that can wait. I am just going to chill today, get cleaned up from yesterday and see where we go the rest of the week as I am off work for another week. Thank you all for your support.

12-24-11 - Christmas Eve. The most anticipated night of the year for young and old alike. What a GRAND season. Tonight we are having our formal family dinner, and I will be splitting time with the family and the display. Last night was the busiest we have ever had. There had to be 4,000 people that saw us last night. Traffic got a bit dicey there for about 15 minutes, but that was my fault. All worked out very well. I just wish I had more time to mingle with the crowd, as I was a one man band having to direct traffic, hand out as many candy canes as I could and answer questions as I was able. We made $932 last night for SOWA and we are at $4320 for the season. Tonight could be busy or quiet, but no matter what it will be a great night. Thanks for all your support, and kind words. Happy Christmas Eve.

12-22-11 - The Winter Solstice. Depending on your view, it is either the longest night of the year, or the shortest day. The first day of Winter as well, but that means The New Year is coming, Spring is shortly behind. 3 Days till Christmas, and while the season is so short for us, in many ways, it is long too, but sooo enjoyable. With the additional word of mouth, we have been busy this week. With the unusually dry weather Mom Nature has given us, it has been awesome viewing. I had to order in another 1000 candy canes, and I can already see that we will run through those by Christmas. We have gone through close to 3000 already, with about another 500 left. I am going to have to plan for that next year. Yesterday I managed to get 5 RGB Balls into the Spiral Tree. We also had our first in show lock up. I ran very late trying to get all the sequences/songs updated with the new Balls, and the show had already started when I pushed the songs from the Build Computer to the Show Computer. Something glitched in that transfer. It was very strange. I was talking to a guest and suddenly noticed no lights, but the song was still playing. I had to just reset the USB interface and in 2 seconds we were back online. Whew! After the show, I did a quick scrub/mod of everything again, and pushed them over again. We should be good to go tonight, and the Balls look great. Today I need to do some badly needed maintenance. Blue is the color this year that wants to fail most. I have 2 Road Arches to fix, 3 Road Candy Canes 3 of which are blue. One Downstairs Window Wrap needs a new string of blue as well. THEN I work on a photo sequence to get some pictures. By Christmas I will be ready for a well deserved and needed break. We will be hosting the family for our get together, which I always like, I know it is a lot of work for Tracy, but having family around you at the Holidays is a huge part of the season. Tracy has a large family, most of which are close by. So we can easily have 35-40 in the house that afternoon. Christmas Eve is our extended show. We will run till 2am this year. Get that last minute shopping done, stop in and catch a song or 2 and say hi if you see me running around on street.

12-18-11 - WOW! What a weekend. We racked em, stacked em, and packed em Fri-Sun as I thought we would. Saturday night was CRAZY, but crazy fun. The visitors have been very complimentary about the display. Seeing the smiles, laughter, and wild amazed eyes is a treat for me. We are doing great on our donation drive for SOWA and the Northshore Wranglers. Over $2400 so far! I would like to see if we could do $5K for the year and everyone has been so generous. We cannot thank you enough for your love and support. The new traffic modifications we did, seem to be helping A LOT! I made the street adjacent to Bob and Marti, (our neighbors across the street), a no parking zone. This has made the street WAY more passable in the busy periods. Tonight most of the guests also did not park adjacent to the display on 236th Ave. That made walking much nicer. I may consider closing that to parking as well. We have plenty past the display anyway. Something to consider possibly for next year. Oh my GOSH! Could Mom Nature have EVER given us in WA state a better Christmas gift? The weather has been AMAZING. Our busiest night, last night, she held off and let it rain overnight. It started after the display shut down. What a treat to have 16 of 18 nights so far DRY! The 2 nights it did rain, it was nothing. A light mist for the most part. The long range forecast looks very mild through Christmas. YES! I am now off work for the rest of the year, and will need to figure out what I want to do with my time. Our family Christmas Letter needs to be written and mailed. Which means some will get them after the Holiday. Oh well. Chris just made it home from WSU on Saturday night and we have to figure out our picture. Hopefully tomorrow. So there have been a few display items that needed attention. One of the Mega Balls looks like it somehow shorted. When I finally checked it, I needed to rebuild and program it on Saturday, and was quite upset when it was not working that night. Sunday morning I went to take it out of the Mega Tree to check it, AGAIN! and, well, I was ashamed to admit that the daw gone thing was not plugged in! Oh my. Once I did that, it worked like a champ tonight! I am going to try to get 5 more made tomorrow or Tuesday and put them in the Spiral Tree. Which will also mean another round of sequence updates as well. The Spiral Tree has been getting A LOT of accolades this year. The visitors love it, and some are surprised when they hear it was in the show last year as well. They are amazed when I tell them how simple it is to make it look like that. I wanted to see if I could get a new song in the show, but I have been modifying Soldiers Silent Night to make it all Red-White and Blue. I wanted to do this since it is a tribute to our Troops abroad. It is taking longer than I thought to modify the sequence. I gave a behind the scenes tour to one our our young, soon to be decorator, guests, Aaron. Aaron is 8 and wants to be an engineer and decorator. So we gave him the royal tour showing him all the tricks and secrets we have. He loved it! I did too. It is always fun to share and see the amazement in those old and young who get that chance. Making the display happen fulfills so much in me. Sharing it in any way possible is what really turns my crank. Which leads me to my closing comment for this entry. Pictures. I HAVE to get some taken to post on the website. Maybe mid week, if the weather holds, I will get some after the closing of the show and post them on the site. It has been SOOO much fun this year, but I am oh sooo tired as well right now. It will be nice to not have to work the next 2 weeks, so I can maybe sleep in for a change. Christmas is in 7 days. Can you believe it?

12-14-11 - I was able to get out and see some of my buddies displays Sunday and Tuesday. I might have one more opportunity early next week to get a couple more in. Other than that, I am now tied to our house for the rest of the season. Not so bad, as I will spend a lot of quality time with our visitors. Starting tomorrow night, I am moving to our extended hours which adds 30 minutes to each night through the end of the year. We will have our traditional Christmas and New Years Eve shows go till 1am each of those nights. So if you are out and traveling home, stop by. Outside of some maintenance items, things are pretty good with the display. There is a few items to tend to this weekend, that need extra time. So Saturday is dedicated to that, then Sunday, I think I will brave the malls to hang out and get more Christmas spirit. I love the malls or shopping centers this time of year. I need to get some pictures to post to the website, and I am thinking of trying a new photo technique, HDR. Google it to see what it is, but I took the pictures to do this last year, without knowledge or software to pull it off. I hope to get some good pics early next week and post them for you to see. The feedback so far is that the display is outstanding this year. As I tried to explain before, about every other year, things just seem to gel for us and it feels really special. This is that year. I am going to see if I cannot get one new song in the show next week. I am off work after Friday and will dedicate some time to see if we can put together a long standing queue selection of "Christmas with a Capital C". If I can, it will be in before the end of the year.

12-11-11 - We have had a phenomenal 10 days of the display. 2 visits by rock star status decorators, Rich Arsenault of Massachusetts and Michael Simmons and his family from Palm Springs. Michael's display last year was voted best in America by the Early Show on TV. They are amazing individuals, along with others we know very well who decorate at this time of year around the world. The display itself has done well, but some minor items are in need of maintenance, as it always does. Tomorrow I should get a chance to fix some of the things that needs attention. The visitors have been awesome. We have been very steady since Light UP! and coming into our busiest time of year. We have had a great mix of new and "seasoned" visitors. Some of the new ones have been SOOO supportive and I have seen several 4 and 5 times already! That is support! So tonight I am going to take a break from outside completely and jet out to Aberdeen and see our good friends, the Collins display. Tomorrow I would like to see my buddy Kevin in Kent, Ian in Carnation, then I head north to Marysville and Lake Stevens on Tuesday. Then, I am display bound for the rest of the season. I love this time of year, and we love you all for your kind gestures, words of support for us and our Charity SOWA. What a GREAT SEASON so far! THANK YOU!

12-4-11 - LATE BREAKING UPDATE! Never in the time I have had the display, have I ever had the problems we had this weekend. I am so upset. I had to take extra measures and time out of my Saturday AND SUNDAY to accommodate the demands that were bestowed upon me. I wasted about 8 hours this weekend complying with those demands. Turns out, Rudy, and ELFIS! my 2 Master of Ceremonies, went to the Screen Actors Guild and filed a grievance against ME AND THE DISPLAY. They wanted a RAISE, and elevation to STAR STATUS. They were refusing to go on with the show unless I capitulated. SAG intervened as mediator and pleaded their case, about how they have become the focal point of the show and all. Would it be such a big thing to give them what they wanted. Here I GAVE them EVERYTHING they have today. They are who they are, because of me. I MADE them what they are. I gave them the positions they now have in the show. ME! THEY DO THIS TO ME! I was heart broken. They are like one of my own. They shine so brightly every time I am around them. Man, oh man. Then, during the middle of negotiations to prove their point, they completely unplugged themselves from the negotiations, and the SHOW! I had visitors expecting my 2 Master of Ceremonies to be smiling and bantering about. There was going to be 2 holes in Center Stage. Elfis was mumbling something about managing the Band, Rudy about him being the center piece for 5 year now. I don't know, something about being crowded out by the band, even though they were behind them. All the scripts, they are already are in MP3's and SEQUENCED! Kevin Dunn, the Demented Elf, was furious when I broke the news that Elfis was blowing off all his hard work. Kevin gave Elfis his voice in life. It was getting really dark there for a while. The lights were stacking up in their favor in a hurry. I fancy myself as a pretty fair negotiator, but they held all the cords. What was I expected to do? I was bent over the Leaping Light Arches as they say in the Display biz. They were shoving my Webber Spiral Tree where the sun doesn't shine. It also just also happens to be the vignette they are a part of this year. I knew I was hosed. All I could do was grit my teeth, open my wallet, and provide the raise to star status they demanded, and, in retrospect, they do deserve. So below shows you what the fuss was all about. You know, after seeing the show tonight, they were right. They needed to be raised to Star status. I put others above them, and that was not right. I am glad this phase of growth and development is behind us. The SHOW MUST GO ON! as they say, and it did tonight, and will the rest of the season. Please read below for the update for the rest of Opening Weekend.



12-4-11 - Light UP! and our first weekend is past us. What an awesome 4 days. For the early season, we had a very steady flow of visitors, and I met some new guests and seasoned visitors who wanted to catch us early. I think we had our best opening 4 days for SOWA as well. We stand at $366 coming out of the first weekend. There is still a minor punch list of items I need to tend to on the display, and a few things I would like to get done to ADD to it. I have some things to work on at work this coming week, but I will try to spilt time as much as possible to get them done. Tonight we had Stephen Ramaley the KOMO TV camera man out for Steve Pool's Parade of Lights. So we will be graced again on the weather forecast one night this month. For those that follow this Blog and remember my "Christmas Vacation" Chevy Chase night 2 years ago. That night started with a special little guy, Bobby who is an electrical prodigy. Well, Bobby came this weekend and I got to talk to him again, the first time since that memorable night. Bobby is now 9, and was telling me all about the lights that are now individually addressable. Quite an advanced subject in our lighting hobby, let alone for a 9 yr old. However, I was glad to be able to point out to Bobby, that I am using those in the display this year. Which brings me to my Mega Balls. A subject I really like, but so far not a lot of guest have noticed my new Balls. Bobby was impressed with them though, as those are using that RGB technology he was alluding to. The Candle vignette has gotten a lot of accolades, and Tracy is proud as can be of them. They are her favorite display item now. By the way, she gave me one of my Christmas presents early this year. A custom embroidered sweat jacket with our display name and LIGHTS to boot. There is a picture on Facebook. It's AWESOME! and you can see it on the KOMO weather forecast as Stephen filmed it while I was conversing with an exchange student from Japan, who had NEVER seen a display period, let alone a Mega Display. We had a great time and hopefully will get included as part of the Weather forecast snippet. A GREAT 4 DAYS! I am so jazzed about this season right now.

12-1-11 - Light UP! Opening Night! It was a long 2 months getting here, but we had an AWESOME night. With the local Northshore Wranglers SOWA team, the Jolly Man himself and a display that still has some glitches but showed her poise. Hosting the Wranglers, was a great way to kick off the season. Mom Nature gave us a cold and somewhat foggy evening, but it was DRY! Thank you very much! I was able to fix some things just before the Sneak Preview, and then during the Preview, but alas, as it goes, not having a dress rehearsal last night, some things failed under use. So, tomorrow afternoon, there is a few things that need tending to, but nothing super critical. Having lights and display items sitting in the elements for 2 months before the show kicks off, has it's affect. Display items are tested and work before going out into the display. Sitting waiting for the Big Day, takes its toll. We started with our early season schedule, so tonight, there is no fixing ANYTHING. I am going to relax, take a badly needed hot tub and go to bed early for the first time in a few months. I need to get the display flyer updated and printed, which means I need to get all my technical stuff wrapped up as well. All in all, we are looking forward to a great season.

11-29-11 - A late update. Breaking News, you heard it here first. INTERCONNECT is FINISHED! No testing was done tonight, I got done too late, and started to clean up the outside some, and got 4 of my Candy Cane Posts done for my neighbor's Bob & Marti. They continue to step things up and attempt to keep synergy between the 2 houses. I love them for the effort and patience they have this time of year. Tomorrow, there is some minor "punch list" items to square away, and then also tomorrow we can run a full on power test, with everything, and then work through the connections to ensure I plugged everything in properly! Then, based on some of the channel swaps I have made, a new Channel template needs to be output, then each song, joke and bit in the show needs to be updated one more time before we run on the 1st. It will be rough, but we should be able to Light Up! on schedule. I need a hot tub badly, but it is too late tonight. Maybe in the morning before work.

11-29-11 - Gotta love Mom Nature. She is her own woman for sure. The weather through next week looks to be cold, but clear! So Light Up! should be dry for us hosting the local SOWA Northshore Wranglers for Opening Night. I am furiously making final connections and finishing punch list stuff to make Light Up! on Dec 1st. I need to finalize all the connections tonight, and hopefully throw all the power back on to check my switched and un-switch power grid. The switched items are on special outlet plugs that turn things on for me at 4:50 and then off 5-10 minutes after the show for the night has ended. We then have to get my Home Office prepped for Santa to work in it all season as well. That is always a guest favorite treat. I managed to get the roof finalized last night while the weather held, and more connections in the yard. So it is crunch time right now. Just me, the display, house, yard, power, programming, finalizing to get through to Light Up! Check back for updates, we are in the home stretch! I am SOOOO looking forward to seeing it all lit up and am really excited about the upcoming season.

11-27-11- Well the long week of work on the display came to a close today and how apropos that it should rain most of the day. The type of rain that really slows things down. It poured with the exception of a 2 hour dry spell. Today being the Sunday after Thanksgiving starts the tradition of more curious guests wondering if somehow I was up and running this weekend. We had 3 drive by's this evening as I was outside in the dark working. So I got some chatting in, and guests who will come back after the 1st. After being what I thought was ahead of schedule, 2 short days, those being Thanksgiving and yesterday to see the Trans Siberian Orchestra concert, some very bad weather, put me a bit behind. I need to catch up. The good thing is that I can finish hooking up in the dark with a headlamp in the yard, it just slows things down a bit. All the interconnect for the roof needs to be completed as well. So working at night can happen, it just slows things down a bit, and I will only get on the roof during daylight. Our first power and communications test on Saturday, yielded that I had some power octopuses that were not turned on, and one bad Cat5 cable that was all of 12" long, prevented 6 other controllers from being seen by my software. After about 15 minutes of work, I was able to shut down the power grid to start interconnect today. So to recap the past 9 days, there was some very good weather, very bad weather, the yard was cleaned up 3 times, all the yard decorations out, positioned, then moved into their final spots. Light controllers hauled out, tested and put into the yard. Communications between everything put in place, most of the DMX universe powered and connected, and not quite 2/3rds of the 556 light connections made. Now, there was a lot of miscellaneous activities intermixed in all that. We had Turkey Day, the TSO concert and to top it off, tonight I saw Garden D'Lights for the first, and, not the last time. The inside Tree was set up, misc help for Tracy on some inside items that only I or 2 people can do. Whew! It was an action packed week with some very long days. Now back to work tomorrow where I will juggle time around as needed to get work done for work and the display. The Dec 1st Light Up still looms, and I want to hold to that for the Northshore Wranglers Special Olympics Team. Things were eerily calm during the week. Not hectic, but now that we are getting down to crunch time, it will get more nerve wracking for sure. All in all, a typical set up! I am off to bed, I am really tired tonight. Check back, I will provide updates as they make sense.

11-24-11 - Happy Thanksgiving! Just a quick update before the day and festivities start. The rain has been insistent and really only let up last night some. This morning looks dry for a few hours, but the yard is super saturated with water. The forecast for today is more wind and rain this afternoon! The yard requires the Road Tree to be strung in lights, and to clean the center Candy Cane Forest of cedar droppings to put the last segment of the Yard River down. The Road Tree requires good weather, because I have to climb in that tree to get the lights in it. The hardware that controls the lights in the yard is all tested and in place. The last of them go on the roof, maybe this morning if it looks OK to get up there I can get some work done there. The supplemental power panel for the season is out and ready to go. If I can, I will start laying out my power grid just before heading to Tracy's sisters for the festivities. I have started to notice more slow drive bys, and one gentlemen pulled up the street to ask how things were going. I suspect the next few days I will start seeing more of those. So, today, will be a short day on the display, but hopefully by tomorrow it will be power and start the 556 connections! Enjoy the day.

11-22-11 - What a difference a day makes. As nice as the weekend was, late yesterday and today it was just as nasty. Today I have changed clothes twice already! It is WET out there. There is one more garage door mural to hang, and some lights to get out when the weather calms down. Outside of that, we are going to be looking at the power grid starting tonight and tomorrow. With the wind and rain the past 24 hours, the yard was needing a bit of attention, I needed to clean a few areas to get items put up. So I spent some time and tended to some leaves, but I really have no where to put them right now because the yard waste bin is overloaded. If the weather calms down tomorrow, there is one last little yard clean up to do, mow up the last leaves and cedar droppings and that will be done for the season! So right now, I am just spending a little time updating the Blog, and drying out before I head out and brave the wet again. Looking at the weather radars, we have a very heavy band over us right now. So maybe I will wait for a bit before braving the next round. Maybe a quick nap!

11-20-11 - WHAT A WEEKEND! Mother Nature was a PEACH for sure. While cold, the weather was clear and dry for the most part. However, that story is changing starting tomorrow afternoon. We are expected to have some high wind and rain move into the area by Tuesday. The good news though, is that the display layout is pretty much set. I juggled up the yard just enough to look fresh and broke some new ground. For the first time ever, there will be display items on the east lawn. The driveway has always been decorated on the east side, the hedge, and the candy cane posts with the rope. This year with the new Candle vignette, things got a bit tight in front of the house, so, there will be a treat to those guests who walk the street and see Santa working in my Home Office. Today, Sunday was a 12 hour day. I opted to get the Mega Tree knocked out, since the weather was going be outstanding. That one display item always takes between 10-12 hours to complete. Last year, I set it up in the SNOW! It is the one display element I have always wanted to update. Either the frame and/or the lights to DMX/RGB or both. Maybe next year. With daylight not long this time of year, I only got 8 hours on the tree. I will finish it tomorrow. So, between Friday late afternoon/evening and with Saturday not being a super long day, we came out of the weekend in outstanding shape. Tomorrow will be finishing the Mega Tree, tweaking placement of items, then a pretty good punch list of things to knock out. After tomorrow, we should be pulling hardware out and looking to start the power grid then all the channel connections! Tonight however, I owe it to myself to get in the hot tub and attempt to get to bed early. Tomorrow is another day, and I am off work all week to focus on the display. 11 days to Light Up, and I feel good about things so far. No pictures lately, no time. Keep checking back.

11-17-11 - I feel like a runner in the starting blocks tonight. We are on the eve of the Big Push. This afternoon, we caught a good break in the weather, so I got the yard about as spic and span as it can be. I cleaned up the leaves, and in doing so, mowed one last major time for a few months. There are still a lot of leaves in the trees, but most of them are in the green belt behind us. The maples that create the biggest mess are finished falling. The only issue is the center plant island where the Candy Cane Forest and River is located. It still has a lot of cedar droppings to come down, but I will have to manage that as best we can. There is no more waiting for everything to fall, it's GO TIME. During the week, I have gotten quite a few things checked and staged to go out in the yard. The Tree Within a Tree is strung, most of the wireframes are tested and ready. Rudy, one of the Master of Ceremonies, needed a new nose job, but his is raring to go now. The only wireframes not out and tested right now is the Yellow Snow Vignette. I am pulling them out tonight. It's amazing how Traditional I get. The first item to go in the yard is always my large wireframe train. It is first in line and maybe tonight it will go in the yard. The roof is completely done, except for the DMX lights, they are always one of the last items pulled out. I did get the new DMX Zap strobe put in its housing and hung from the roof fascia. I updated all the sequences last night to put the new Candles in all the songs. The Spiral tree will be tomorrow afternoons project during the day when I can see better. I did have to get some LED lights from Creative Displays. I needed some Multi Colored strings, both M6 and C6. Not sure how I cut myself short, but I wanted to make sure I have enough spares. There is one outstanding item. The formal Nativity. Joseph and the Sheppard took a beating last year. I am working with the vendor to get replacements. I thought I had them coming, but have not gotten confirmation from them. Joseph can go for the season if need be, but the Sheppard may be beyond repair. He is headless. I need to see if I still HAVE his head. They still keep talking about possible snow as well. Last year I set up the Mega Tree in the snow, not a lot of fun being on a ladder up and down for 10 hours trying not to slip, hurt myself and damage the Mega Tree. So tomorrow starts the Big Push, and I eerily feel like I am ahead of the schedule. Time will tell.

11-13-11 - Oh man, I am really beat. The weekend started out great with a lot of work on the display. I was cruising though some items like getting the Candle Vignettes done. Found bulbs that work great for the flames, attached the flames, made cords and viola, they look marvelous. Then Tracy chimes in, "you going to sequence them?" "No" was my answer, then she said, "they would look great if you did". Hmmm, kink in plan. Sequencing is DONE, but the lights in the flames are incandescent and I know there is "simulated flicker" effects I could do to make them really look awesome. OK, now I have to UPDATE all the songs, AGAIN! to put the new Candles in them. Saturday started out nice weather wise, so "up on the roof top, quick, quick, quick"! Finished the snowflake fall pattern, and wireframes that go up there before the rain set up in. So down in the garage to get things done. Between Friday night to Saturday night, I got a great "punch list" of things done. Then BAM! Sunday comes along, no rain. If you check out the Facebook page, you will see the "Fall 2011" album of the leaves on the ground. Well more fell since those pictures were taken early Saturday morning. I HAD to work on getting the leaves around the house, yard, plant beds and culvert cleaned out. Mother Nature, while kind enough let MOST of the critical leaves drop, she did it all at once. I spend 8 hours today, Sunday, raking, blowing and mowing up leaves, and cedar tree droppings. YES! 8 hours. I was a wet noodle when I was done. Fortunately it did not rain today so I was able to get everything as clean as possible,..... for now. We are supposed to have a storm on Wed that will assist with the rest of the critical trees for the display. So while I lost today for working on display items, I had to get our canvas cleaned up. So, I have mixed emotions for today. After dinner, I reviewed ALL the sequences to check them before I apply an update for the Candles. I created a new template, and will get the Candles done as I can. Once I finish this update, it is off to the Hot Tub. I REALLY need it tonight after all the work in the yard. This coming week, I have to finish the Tree within a Tree lights, and the Spiral Tree before next weekend. Some wireframes are out and tested, including the Light Fan. All Leaping Light Arches are tested and ready to toss in the yard. So even thought I lost today, per se, I am still in OK shape. Next Friday starts to coin and old football term, "Hell Week". Still lots to do! That's all for now. Check back.

11-10-11 - Well, this is the first mid-week update in a while. Sequencing for now is finished! The last song was completed this evening. I will do some tweaking before Light Up!, but for now, the focus is 100% on the display. I lost last night due to a power outage in the area. We thought an auto accident caused a problem, but turns out a feeder cable to our neighborhood failed. So we were without power for 7 hours. We have a backup generator to power some circuits in the house, but I won't take a chance and fire up the computers, nor is there any good working conditions in the garage. So I relaxed and read some. Tonight I updated the Show Computer. It is the brain for the display, and Woodinville Wonderland's Radio Station. It needed a Light O Rama software, and Christmas Music update. I pulled out one of my FM transmitters (I only have 3,... don't ask), and Jingle-ling, we have our radio station broadcasting on 101.9 FM! I am sitting here updating the Blog and listening for the first time this season to my Christmas Music Library. Which is now over 10.6Gb. So I will be broadcasting all day/night until we Light Up the Display on December 1st. Listening always gets me so much more in the groove for the season. So tonight was light, last night was VERY light, storing up my energy, because tomorrow being Friday, after work will start a very heavy weekend. My last before the BIG PUSH. All next week I will be in the garage or yard every night. It's Crunch Time! It's just me, the house, the yard, 106,321 lights (total to date, this will go higher) and all the vignettes that will make 2011 a special season. What's it gonna be? It is true insanity for the next 21 days. Check back, I will update as much as I can.

11-6-11 - The visit with Mom this week was really nice. Spent some time with my buddy's Craig, and Danny. It was a treat just to have some down time, from the display and otherwise, even though I had some paperwork to get done for her, and get everything caught up. I wish she would make it up to WA one more time to be with us for the Holidays, but alas, she does not want to travel, nor leave her home. I can see I will be going down every other month to see her after the Holidays. Tracy wanted a "Date Night" on Friday, so we went out for sushi. It's important to keep a balance in everything, and we had a nice evening to ourselves. We are into November, and the mornings over the past few days have been very chilly/frosty. I got quite a bit done this weekend on the display. The Drive/walkway rope lights are now strung from the Candy Cane posts. The Candy Cane border on 236th is done, the west drive hedge and light post have lights, the Dolphin River, Snowflake falls on both sides of the house, were put onto the frames, and then put in place and secured to the house. I assembled the Church Arches with the rope and icicle lights, finished Mrs Snowman's paint and put her stand back on. Then I went to the roof. I managed to muscle the Bethlehem Star up to the roof pinnacle, Santa "Evel Knievel" Claus is in his place on the roof, and I started working on the 16 snowflake pattern that is on the west roof face. I am going to change up how I do secure those 16 snowflakes, so I am painting some wood so that it won't be seen at night. I got the new Strobe housing made and painted. I need to get some acrylic and vinyl, then mount the strobe in the housing, then on the house. 3 of the 4 roof controllers are in place, the FM antenna is up, and by next weekend I will be firing up the radio station to broadcast my commercial free Christmas Music. I will play them till New Years. They always help getting me into the Christmas Spirit! I got a quick mow on the yard to get some of the leaves up, Hugo the Gardner showed up, Saturday. He has one more visit this month to edge and weed the plant beds before he is done till March. We talked about the leaves and how LATE fall really is. He is new for us this year and getting his first taste of my November routine, however Mother Nature is not cooperating, and there are STILL a LOT of leaves in the trees. I start my BIG push in 2 weeks, on November 18th. That is the day I target for the last lawn mow of the season, but there will still be plenty of leaves to contend with. The leaves are going to really affect the "River Rock River Lights", the last 2 hedges and the Road Tree. They may be the last things I get done before Light Up, which is still being targeted for Dec 1st. The last 2 sequences are in process and should be done early this week. At that point, it will be 100% display focus till Dec 1st. I still feel OK with the schedule, hopefully that stays in tact. I will get some pics of the work tomorrow at lunch, but for now, I am going to treat myself to a Hot Tub, I need and deserve it! Thanks for stopping in and checking out the update.

10-30-31 - Happy Halloween, well, a day early I guess. Saturday was an awesome day for weather. I tore into the garage attic and under the house. Jordan, my Great Niece came over to help haul stuff out and test lights. Even though she was only here for a few hours, she got a LOT done for me, carrying stuff out, testing and she even assembled the Road Arches while I pounded the brackets in place. 3 of 4 borders are done. Tracy finished the covers for the candle flames, you can see them below. They turned out great. In the pictures below you can see the progress, the Road Arches along the front of the house on 183rd St that Jordan set up, the North Pole border on the drive and walkways, the blowmold cast of characters reside on porch for the time being, the Candy Canes are pictured also on the porch but tough to discern in the pile. They are the last border to complete and they go out on 236th Ave. I will get the Candy Canes on 236th Ave next weekend after Halloween. We have never had a vandalism problem, knock on wood, and why tempt fate now. Although we really do not get any Trick or Treaters where we live, but they do come and go to get to the other planned communities where the houses are closer. Lastly you see the Tree Within a Tree, and the Spiral Tree frames are assembled. They get completed in the driveway (lights on them), then carried into place later in November. Lights may start to go on the Tree Within a Tree today. I also head to Los Angeles today to spend a few days with Mom. So it will be a light day getting things squared away to get Tracy's Lexus back into the garage! You can see in the picture below, it spent the night out in the rain last night :( She hates this time of year when things are strewn everywhere! Outside of stringing lights on the Spiral and Tree Within a Tree, I have a few small things to get done. Oh yeah the new Atomic Martin 3000 showed up as well! I need to get the weatherproofing housing made for it as it will be hung under the eves to compliment the one that has been in the yard now for 3 seasons. I will hopefully get the last 2 songs done while I am at Mom's so I won't be completely idle while in LA. I feel like things are progressing well, but I always seem to get bound up against the clock at the very end, so time will tell! Check back.

10-26-11 - The new DMX Zap Strobe showed up this week. I had it blinking last night in the garage! The weather enclosure needs to be made for it before it can be hung from the eves. This should add some pop to the viewing from 236th Ave. We also did a mock up test of the new RGB Mega Ball on the Mega Tree frame. The way the balls are hung inside, will also need to accommodate the DMX communications that drive the Balls. That needs some slight tweaking, but we should be good to go. It was fun to see them all hung from the tree and in action! Alas, I took them down for now, then remembered that I forgot to get my power reading for them! Ugh. I can mock them up in the garage and get that done. I contacted my Great Niece, Jordan yesterday. She is getting to the age where she is saving up for her first car, when she gets her license. So we will have her help me out this weekend. EVERYTHING comes out of its hiding places. I will have her help me gets things out, and then she can do a lot of the testing I have to do myself. So needless to say, we will keep her as busy as she wants to be, and contribute to the Jordanmobile fund! It will be fun. So, the big push starts this weekend, only to be put on a slight hold. I will be heading to Moms on Sunday evening for 3 days in LA. I will be working from down there. Once I get back, every spare moment that is not work or sleep, will be spent on the display Set Up. The past few nights/mornings it has been very cool and crisp. Hopefully that will work it's magic on the lawn and leaves!

10-22-11 - A productive Sunday for sure! Yesterday a buddy in crime, Kevin Thomas (Wirekat) and I attended a training session for Light O Rama (LOR), the software I use for sequencing and a lot of the hardware, controllers that blink the lights. They had none other than Chuck Smith a.k.a. owner of Planet Christmas doing the class. While Kevin and I did not get a lot of new info out of the class, it was great to spend the day with Kevin, Chuck, and meet some new folks in the area as well, and talk Christmas. Yesterday was a great day to be indoors anyway, as it poured most of the day. Mother Nature gave me a great day today, so I jumped on a few things outside. I managed to get the driveway light posts pressure washed, then got lights on the east driveway post and hedge. I got the Candy Cane Forest trunk wraps on. You can see the CC Forest below. It is a plant island in the middle of the yard, that has 4 large cedar trees that I decorate the trunks in my candy cane colors of red and white. This is always messy if real wet, so I was glad to knock it out while it was still pretty dry. You can see around that picture how the leaves are STILL not really ready to start falling. Also in the lower left of the CC Forest, you see the river rock stream that gets blue lights running through the island. Those will go down later after most of the cedar droppings fall off the trees. From the angle I took the picture, right in front of the CC Forest on the grass, is what I call Center Stage. It is the main area you see as you walk onto the street in front of our house. I may re-do last year, and put the Mega Tree again in Center Stage, but change how things are around it, to give it a different look. I also got the icicles up on the road arbor, and below also attached a picture of the porch. You can see the new reindeer additions, the re-stained wood, and if you look close you will see lights on the bush to the left. The reindeer are there for now, they may not stay in that spot, we will see. Also below is a picture of the completed candles minus the flame tops. Tracy is working on getting those covered in material, but we have some time to get those done, they won't hit the yard till the big mid November yard push. If you look behind the Candles, you see a couple of boxes. The candy canes I hand out during the season showed up this past week, all fresh and ready to go! Lastly below you see a picture of the Mega Tree frame. Today I touched up the PVC with paint, and secured it together with a ton of zip ties. It almost takes me as long to zip tie the joints as it does to set it up! What I did not get a picture of as it was dark, is the mock up of the new Mega Ball inside the Mega Tree frame. I need to get those installed and one test before they come down to be installed again in the yard after the Mega Tree gets all its lights. I have to move the frame into the yard and finish the assembly there. Just stringing the lights can take 8 hours alone! After the 4 colors (R-G-B-W) get layered onto the frame, I then will re-install the Mega Balls and the curtain strobes that hang inside the frame as well. The computer work is progressing very well. I have 3 more songs to get updated, and as I was finishing Solder Silent Night, I got the brilliant idea to modify that sequence. That song was added 2 seasons ago in honor of my nephew-in-law who was stationed in Iraq for Christmas. Anyway without going into a lot of detail, since it is in honor of our troops abroad, I am going to revamp the sequence to be Red, White and Blue only. Oui Ve! One of my prize arbors in the backyard attached to the patio, which Tracy has wanted me to sand, re-stain and fix up a bit, suffered a fatal blow on Saturday. Our gardeners were here and Tracy asked them to remove the roses around the arbor, and in some bad miscommunication, they took out he roses, AND the arbor. To get it out, they had to bust it up! They are great guys, and of Spanish decent, so obviously was lost in translation. All Tracy and I could do was look at each other and laugh. They took away all the pieces, and roses very nicely. Tracy talked to him today, and explained why we were so sullen when we paid them. He felt awful when he realized it. Another project in the Spring. We had a quick visit home from Tracy's youngest, Chris who is at WSU. He blew in late Friday night, and headed back out this evening. It was nice to see him for the few minutes he was actually home. Next Sunday early evening, I am heading to my moms in L.A. for a visit. She has been hankering for me to come down. This will be my best shot before I am completely engulfed with the display. I will work from her house, and won't lose the weekend for the most part, on the display. I actually at this point still feel good about the state of things. We will SEE how that is in a few weeks. Check back.





10-16-11- I finished the front porch during the week. That allowed me to get Set Up back on track. So I managed to get the porch lights done (posts/railing/balusters) then I started getting some of the bushes wrapped. I had to take an inventory of my multi-color LED C7's. I use those on the hedges, and over the years, they have been failing at a decent rate. Fortunately I ordered and kept spares, but the issue is that the strings are not compatible from 2009 on. The early strings ordered in 2006, 2007 & 2008 have a power wart, and everything from 2009 on have the rectifiers on the light string. So I can't mix the strings together. So as failures occur, the old strings dwindle, and get replaced with the new C7's. I have 34 of the older strings left. 6 of them went onto the front spiral trees, and that leaves 28. So 21 of them will go on the east hedge, with 7 spares for the season. I did have a good spare inventory of the C7s, and will need to order another case for spares. Spares. That is a whole dynamic in and of itself. I keep more in spares and reserve than some use in their entire displays. With a show a large as we have gotten, I need to make sure when LED lights fail, I have replacements. I have to maintain spare Controllers as well. It is a interesting topic all in itself. Anyway, so today, I had to get into my spare LED C7s to strip the tags (every light string I have in the display gets all the little tags and fuse bags stripped off them) and test them to ensure they work. You would think they should JUST work, but you've got to remember where the LED lights are made, China, and that they sit sometimes for a few years here at my place before they are needed. Of the C7s for the hedges and spiral trees, I use a total of 86 strings of 25 count LED strings. The older stings failed pretty fast due to the way I use them, blinking and flashing. So I had about a 15% failure rate each year, and last year during Tear Down a lot were dead after the season. The newer strings seem to fail a lot less, more like 1%. The Mega Tree frame was set up today as well, so that I could finish the Mega Tree Balls set up. Remember those are new this year, and I really like the way they are getting used in the sequences so far. Of which the computer work and sequencing. I am doing pretty good there. I am into updating the songs, and if things go well, I might even get a new song in! Not that I will do it. There is another light crazy who I sold the old yoke lights to, who wanted to take a stab at sequencing for me. The trade is my older Chauvet strobes that I have never used in the show. They don't quite work for me the way I need them to. Anyway, Jeremy does a DJ gig and they will do fine for him. I haven't posted many pictures lately, so I will get one of the Mega Tree frame and post it. That is PVC and looks sort of alien with no lights on it. Tracy came home from her vacation late on Saturday and tonight I took a break to go see Blue Man Group with Tracy, Cameron, his girlfriend Heidi and her son Jake. We were celebrating Cam and Heidi's B-days, so we finished up the night at a brazilian steak house. Boy am I stuffed. Things are progressing, maybe not as far along as I would like to be, but one thing for sure, "it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas....." Thanks for taking the time to read read this stuff, I actually enjoy documenting this stuff. Off to bed, I got a busy week at work this week.

10-9-11 - Well not a full weekend was spent on the display officially. I managed to get the rest of the red roof outline lights up, and the house C9's. While Mom Nature allowed, I mowed the lawn on Saturday, and the more I looked AT the front porch, which gets lights wrapped on the railing/balusters, and porch posts, I realized I have to re-stain the porch. Which entails stripping, sanding, cleaning and THEN re-staining. So today was mostly spent getting it stripped and starting to sand. It really needs to dry more before more sanding can be done. I will have to work on it in the evenings and split time with the computer. Because I need it stained before next weekend. There were a few miscellaneous items for the display worked on today while the porch was drying, but nothing of significance. I got my 2011 sequence template completed during the week, and have started updating last years material with the new channels. That updates my channel count, if my math is right, to 550 channels of animation for 2011. I will have to double check that, but we added 71 channels this year. I got all the jokes, the 2 closing "picture" songs and the bits before Elfis's and Rudy's 2 solos updated. So a pretty good jump, but the real work comes when I start the songs. I think I am going to use the closing from last year, and I would like to see about shortening the Opening Announcement, but if need be, I can go with it too. One other thing that has me concerned. The leaves on the trees. Normally in late August they start to turn, and in the latter part of Sept, Oct and through the first part of Nov, they fall. I don't rake leaves. I mow them up. They are just barely now starting to turn. Which means that they may go all the way into December! Not good. Cords and display items make it hard to manage leaves after the yard has been populated. We will have to see what the next few weeks brings for the trees. Tracy is still on vacation until next Saturday. So I have the weeknights to get the porch worked on, and computer work.

10-4-11- Our first decent setback for the year. Quite a few weeks ago, I started the computer work to update the songs to reflect the new display updates in the show. Well, sometimes things don't turn out as you planned. Long story short, the 5 hours invested in updating a template for 2011 5-6 weeks ago, getting ready for the time (now) to start updating all the songs/sequences, was for NOT! I realized a slight mistake then caused some difficulty last night as I tried to apply the new updates to all the songs/bits. So I blew 5 hours, plus at least 2 last night! Argh. What it means is that I will have to re-do the template. While the second time may go a bit faster, it will only be slightly. So I may save about an hour of work. I will still have to spend 4 hours just to get to the point where I can START to update all the 2011 material. Not good, but not critical at the same time. I will lose that time, but I believe I can still get what I need done. After a frustrating night last night realizing this issue, and a long day/night tonight for work, I will have to start fresh tomorrow to get moving on the computer work. Fortunately with Tracy on Holiday in Florida, it is me and the Golden Girls around the house, so I can focus on this without worry. So, while frustrating, I do try to take it all in stride as it is part of the theory that "Stuff Happens" when doing something on the magnitude we create here at Woodinville Wonderland.

10-2-11 - Weekend 1 in the books for Set Up. Mother Nature true to form gave me a pretty nice day today, and a so-so day yesterday. I was still able to get 7 of 8 window wraps on the house, one wrap took a header and cracked, so I am fabricating another cross member to replace the fractured one. That will have to go up later this week. I got the icicles up, the Gable Wreath and the lower tier of red roof outline lights. I had to take a call it quits at that point late this afternoon, to get the lawn mowed. Storms are moving in tonight and during the first part of the week. I was able to get the lawn mowed, walked the dogs and start dinner, then it started pouring! Nice timing. Today one of the neighbor girls stopped by with a friend. Not that they saw me decorating and wanted to visit, they were peddling magazines for the local Junior High, Timbercrest. Her friend had not seen the display yet and she was describing it to her. Then came the question. Not, "What am I adding NEW this year?", rather, "What NEW SONGS are you adding?" ARGH!!! The knife to the stomach. I laughed and gave her the 411 on the year I have been having, and that there will most likely be no new songs. She was fine with that, and just wanted to know. If I get do a chance, "Christmas with a Capital C" will be the new addition. I now have to think about my Opening and Closing announcements to see if I need to employ the Demented Elf, Kevin Dunn (voice of Elfis) to help. I got the garage situated, the pop up shelter on the pad next to the shed, and quite a few totes down from storage in the shed. Oh yeah, I got the wonderful news that Gearsource collected my credit card info for the new Zap Strobe, then I got an email saying that the one I wanted was not available. I am really mad about this. They have done that to me before. Gearsource is a used theatrical equipment broker. They had another Atomic Martin 3000, but it was $100 more than the one I THOUGHT I was getting. The red roof outline C9's. This has to be my last year with them. I wanted to do RGB lights to replace them this year, but no time to work at it. So next year, that will be a priority. Those C9's I have, I have NEVER liked. The wires on them are not nice and braded like most lights. They are miserable to work with. I got them from a vendor that I will never use again, and have dealt with them, this being the 4th year of cussing at the quality. Oh Yeah! I did forget, I finished the Red Candle and will get pics of the 3 together later. Now Tracy needs to get the flame covers made. All in all a very productive first 2 days of Set Up. I am beat, and am looking forward to a shower. If it wasn't damp outside, I would take a Hot Tub, but I think it will be shower, then early to bed, I am done. Check back to see how we are progressing.

10-1-11 - Well, it is early (6:30am), I just dropped Tracy off at the airport for her girls vacation in Florida for 2 weeks. Last night I got home from a whirlwind business trip all this past week, sipping on the last of the morning Joe, and getting ready to commence Set Up! Today I have a the last of the candles to get the lights in, I need to get the garage organized, start pulling totes of lights out, and the roof line icicles down out of the attic in the garage. Hopefully by Sunday afternoon, we have the icicles up, and the window wraps tested and put onto the house. The icicles are traditionally the first item to commence Set Up for the season. The yard plan is not at all defined. I have never gone this late without it. I have some ideas in my minds eye how I will jumble up the look this year. Anyway, it is what it is. The yard, except for bushes and tree trunk wraps does not get worked on until around Thanksgiving anyway. Computer work will start Monday night. I ordered another Atomic Martin 3000 zap strobe. I will have 2 this year. The DMX strobes I have had for years playing with, are just not what I am looking for performance wise. So I am hopefully going to sell them. The weather forecast for today is chance of showers, tomorrow is supposed to be dry during the day, and showers later in the afternoon. It's still dark outside, gotta change into working clothes, 61 days till Light Up. SET UP, HERE WE GO!!!!

9-17-11 - I went to my website today and saw my count down to Christmas timer. 98 DAYS!! Oh MY! Last weekend Tracy and I went to Port Ludlow for a Stay and Play golf weekend. Good time golfing and enjoying the last of the great weather. So no work done at all last weekend on the display. Since then, I realized that Mrs Snowman needed more of an overhaul than just her base. That vignette, as I said before, was my first outdoor Christmas items that I made and added. The Snow Family is about 12 years old, and they have had several paint jobs, but the Mrs really needed some body work too. I had to recreate a few build up parts for her that were starting to deteriorate, and rebuild other parts that just could not easily be replaced. I had to use wood glue, wood filler and bondo to shape her shawl, as that was not going to be removed very easily. The rebuild turned out pretty decent, and you won't be able to tell that it is not all plywood. She is still in a state of repair and just getting to the point of priming to get her done. You can see her in the picture below. After a first coat of primer, I had a few spots that still needed bondo to fill in gaps and holes. Candle Update. 2 are pretty much done. Tracy needs to sew covers to go over the flame parts. I will put a flickering bulb inside it to simulate a flame. Tough to see in the picture, but the white square in the right picture, next to the gold candle is the coroplast with all the holes punched to put the lights through. This was the skin for the green candle you see in the left picture after ut was painted and cut so that it bends around the frame I made. In the left picture, you also see the crafting of the 3rd and last candle flame. They are made out of 1/4" hot rolled steel rod, that is cut and hand bent using the vise you see to get the shape. They are then welded to create the assembled frame. To get the "shape", I have a "pattern" on a piece of paper that is on the table. Kind of tough to see it in the picture, but it is taped down. I work between the vise (you can see the last rod in it) and the paper to bend the steel into shape. Each flame is 6 rods and each rod takes me about 30 minutes or so to get them bent right. All 3 flames are done, and the 2 I made this weekend are being primed and painted. So if I guestimate, each candle takes approximately 12 hours to complete. They will be 3 different sizes, with the gold being the shortest at 36", and the red (not yet done) will be the tallest at 48" for the bases. They are 6" apart in size. Tracy thinks they look really good. The lights in the base, match the candle color with warm white LEDs simulating the wax dripping over the sides. I HAVE to start the computer work this week. There is one more weekend to complete the candles, and a few misc other items, because Oct 1st, we start set up. At this point, set up will be a bit slower and I will have to do maintenance work on display items while I set up, just because it was such a hectic year. OH MY!



9-5-11 - Labor Day. A day or weekend most relax and take it easy. NOT!!!! Well, for the rest of the day I certainly am, I am beat. I have been working on a few items over the last few days, mostly the next installment of the Candle Vignette, and getting Mrs. Snowman finished. I also realized that Mr. Snowman, the co-star of the Yellow Snow Vignette also needed a new base. So he is in the process of a bit of an overhaul and some fresh paint as well. Then there is the work on the house. All maintenance that also has an eye to the display. The gutters were VERY dirty. I hang the Icicle lights from them, and they needed cleaning LAST year. So I bit the bullet and started them yesterday. Well, that also entails getting on the roof, which, means I need to blow the gutters clean, clean the vents, and the other wonderful task of knocking out/down the wasps nets from under the eves. It has got to be funny watching me up on the roof, spraying, swiping, scraping them buggers. In 15 years of being in the house, I have never been stung once and I have to clear them every year. I may have just jinx it now. Anyway, I finished today with both the gutters, and the final assault on the wasps. The gutters on the back of the house will have to wait till spring at this point. I am beat. I also mowed the lawn yesterday to boot. By last night I was ready for a hot tub, cigar, and a nice glass of wine. So we are in Sept, which means the evenings during the week, I will start the computer work on the sequences from last year. I have to go review the updates I did to my template and start applying that to the songs, then, get the new feature channels embedded into them. But, for now, I am off to go outside, enjoy the beautiful weather we are having today (and looks like the rest of the week). Keep checking back, enjoy!

8-27-11 - Work is underway on the Candle Vignette. A mistake today cost me almost 2 1/2 hours worth of work. Argh! Candle number one is well underway. I have to punch literally thousands of holes to insert the lights into for the candles. So after a few rounds of testing, I decided that I would use my trusty "old" soldering iron. Now, this iron has never seen solder. I use this tool only as a burning element. More like an old wood burner. By using this on the coro, it is WAY easier to punch the holes, plus they are cleaner too. I will make the candles using the coro as a skin that will wrap around a frame once the lights are on them. Painting is underway on the first candle. Usually on a project like this, with multiple units, I figure out all my mistakes on this one, then kick the others out a bit quicker. I also started to fix Mrs Snowman of the Yellow Snow vignette. Her base was trashed. I needed to remake it. So tonight I cut it out, prepped her and the new base then glued it into place. Next for her is to patch her a bit, prime and new paint where needed. She will be good a new!

8-25-11 - It's a wrap II. The Chase Trees are DONE! All 16. Man, I forget just how much that wreaks havoc on my fingers, hands, wrists, arms and shoulders. You wouldn't think it is, but you have to see how it is done. I am glad they are done. My Peanuts Nativity Sally, the Angel for that vignette, needed some patching and painting on her back side. The result of her pole falling over during take down and the mounting brackets that were screwed in ripped out. I had to scrape and sand the paint, get all the wood splinters removed, holes filled, sanded, primed and painted. So tonight was the final coat of paint. This weekend I will start evaluate my list as to what has to be fixed from last year, and start pulling items out to get them fixed. As a stretch item to still make this year, I have long admired Ron Lister's candles from Christmas Wonders in Florida. I have had one sort of done for 2 years now, it is actually very nice looking, but needed to go in a different fabrication direction to make the 3 candle set. I bought and was going to use 10" PVC pipe, yes, 10 inches. It would have been nice, but trying to get the lights strung from the inside was going to be a PIA! Alas, I am backing up and going to see if I can modify the method Ron used, Coroplast, which is like corrugated cardboard, only plastic. I need to buy 4'x8' sheets to do it, and have to get the material. I'd really like to get them done, and I think I can squeeze making 3 candles into a weekend. I postponed a week long business trip today that was to be next week. Turns out Hurricane Irene, while affecting the east coast is affecting my meeting schedule next week as well. One of my colleagues who lives in Nashua, NH, and has to fly out this Sunday for the meetings, lives in the targeted eye of Irene as it hits land this Sunday! So I decided to put off my biz trip for 4 weeks. Trip now, trip later, hopefully should not be too much of a hassle. I have a cousin, Donna, her family, and my aunt Helen who are on Long Island. Also my Group Director, Marty who I go to China with, and was just scuba diving with, is in Kure Beach, NC. All are battening down the hatches. We are keeping an eye on them, and I hope everyone on the east coast makes it out OK.

8-22-11 - Progress on the Chase Trees is slower than anticipated. While the frames are much nicer, more rounded, a bit taller, the wire from the lights wants to slide upwards toward the pinnacle when you string them on. So what I need to do is zip tie the wire to the frame in MANY spots. I am using 5 strings of - 50 count LEDs per tree, and I would say I am using at least 15 zip ties per string. For a total of 250 lights per tree and roughly 75 zip ties!. So what I thought would take 20-25 minutes, is taking more like 45-50 minutes per tree. That includes assembling the new frames and stringing the lights. So far 8 of 16 are done as shown below on the right. The left picture is a before and after. The old frames were Wreath Easels you can buy in craft stores. They come in different sizes. These are a mainstay for us Christmas decorators to create these Mini Trees. Some will use tomato cages instead. The only issue with the wreath easel, is that they are triangular in shape which is not so bad, but they have a tendency to bow when stringing the lights as you can sort of see. They both have the same amount of lights. The middle picture is the frame on my turntable with the first of 4 strings of lights on the frame. We managed to get Chris back to WSU on Saturday. Long day. Basically 10.5 hours of driving, plus loading, unloading. We did not leave till late, and got home right at midnight, ugh.

8-17-11 - Well our scuba trip to North Carolina did not go completely as planned. As usual, Mother Nature had her say in things. She must have it out for me diving on the east coast, because this is the second time that she has put a damper on things. We managed to get 1 day of diving in, 2 dives to get fossilized Megladon Sharks Teeth. The second day was completely blown out and we did not even get the boat underway. Oh well. I may be planning a quick 2 day dive trip to my old "bubbling grounds" Catalina Island in SoCal. The boys want to see what I have raved about for years. I managed to create a Facebook page for the display. I am now trying to figure out how I can put the "Like" link onto the webpage. I have tried, so Kevin! Help! I have a ping out to my buddy Wirekat, Kevin Thomas to assist. I am in the process of now re-stringing/wrapping lights on the Chase Trees. My first attempt did not go so well, so that tree will need to be undone, then give it another go. I usually have to get a pattern down to get the lights to go evenly around the tree. On the mini tree frames, the lights want to creep upwards so it is necessary to put zip ties in place to keep the lights in place on the frame. Saturday we take Chris back to WSU for the school year, so I lose one day of working on the weekend for any display items. Tic, toc. The clock is running and certainly not going to slow down or stop for anything.

8-10-11 - As they say in the film industry, the Mega Forest is a wrap! and that they are. See the pictures below. The one on the left, outside of seeing Deeogee's favorite position in life for a belly rub (the Golden Girls love to watch me in the garage working), shows one of the Mini Trees in the process of wrapping a Super String. I have a turntable/lazy Susan that the frame sits on. I turn it as I wrap the lights on the frame. The one on the right shows the Forest in all it's glory. 13,000 lights on 8 trees. I think I like putting pictures here in the Blog to show things, it helps explain what I mean. Anyway, next on the Display docket is to take what was the "Chase Trees" in the Light Fan vignette, and re-wrap them onto better frames. There are 16 of those, and I unwrapped 8 of the old frames last night. I will get the other 8 unwrapped tonight. They only have 250 lights on each frame so it took me about 50 minutes to get the lights off those 8 frames and it will take about 20-25 minutes per tree to assemble the new frame and get the lights put back on. That will complete the infrastructure upgrades for 2011. Tuesday night I took a break and worked inside on the new 2011 song template. I have to update all my old sequences with the new channel additions. So I think I got most of my updates into the template, and am ready to start working the computer side of the display very soon. Tomorrow I head to Wilmington, NC for some internal work meetings and a scuba diving expedition. Should be fun, fun, fun.



8-4-11 - We have RGB Mega Tree Balls! After a few glitches in getting the DMX part of the Balls worked out, we are moving very nicely. To give you an idea of what they are (see pics below), they are acrylic globes and tops that have a CAT5 cord coming out of the top. Inside the ball is a PCB board that is the DMX module and gives the light it's brain. Then there are 3 LED module strips glued back to back, which when told, can turn any color I chose by blending colors, the colors you see below, R-G-B or by turning the R-G-B all on at the same time, they turn white. The pictures are washed out because of the light in the garage, but at night, they will look awesome. The pictures below are the same light, just different colors. The DMX part had to be programmed, and it was the set up and programming of the modules that was a bit difficult due to some issues with the programming interface, both software, and the hardware. Again, there will be 3 strings of 5 of these balls for a total of 15. If I have time, I will be putting these on top of the Candy Cane Posts that line the driveway and walk to the house, replacing the LED light that is now inside the globes on those posts. Tonight I finished 2 of 15, I need to get some hardware tomorrow, but I should have all 15 done on Saturday. Then, it is back to making Super Strings of R-G-B-W lights to wrap the 2' Mini Trees. Today, I decided to re-finance the house. My sister-in-law found a smoking 30yr rate, and it makes sense with the uncertainty of the economy this week. Due to that uncertainty, I think it is prudent to put my plans for a video screen on the west facing roof pitch on hold this year. Things are just too scary right now to be spending money like that. So video will wait for 2012. I am going to post this to see how the pictures look since this is a first for the Blog. Keep checking back, we are full steam ahead on the display.



7-26-11 - Well, today being Tuesday, marks 4 straight days I put work in on the display. The first time all season! Over the weekend I started working on the Mega Tree Balls, and converting them to 15 RGB elements rather than the individual strings of colored R-G-B-W balls I had. This will look better, and give me more control over the look of the Balls inside the tree. I had to order a few things to continue to proceed, so I then switched to converting what I called the Mega Tree Forest, the 4 - 5ft and 4 - 2ft trees that were always in front of the Mega Tree. I am converting the entire forest to be 4 colors. That way the look will be more uniform when the Mega Tree changes color. So the past 2 evenings, I have been making and stringing Mega String Lights. These are individual 100 count light strings of the colors, R-G-B-W, that I zip tie into one bundle, then wrap it on the tree. Sort of time consuming, and each 5' tree has 2k lights, and takes me about 3 hours to get one tree completely done. It is not as simple as it sounds. In the past I had one 5' and one 2' tree in each color, and it was OK, but not balanced. This way things will really pop. This is the first Blog update since Expo, so I had to get my website updates off the show/travel laptop and put them onto the house computer, which is the master computer around here. There won't be many big additions for the display this year unless I decide to get the MEGA video screen I am talking to one vendor about. We had a conversation over a week ago, and we have not yet touched base to finalize on things. 2011 should be the year I pop over 100K of lights in the display. Not something I been driving toward, but something that has progressed naturally. Some race to get there, due to some status that 100K lights means something. I guess it will mean that I am a true MEGA Display now. Oh well, as long as the visitors are happy, that is all that I need. I have to go to the east coast in August for a scuba diving weekend. I am really looking forward to that. Aug 13 & 14 we will have a day dive on some wrecks off Wilmington, NC, and what they call the Megladon Ledge. A spot where fossilized Megladon (BIG prehistoric sharks) teeth are known to be in plenty of existence. It should be fun. I just made Tracy's travel arrangements to visit our Mexico friends, Darla Allison, at their second home in Naples, FL. That being the first weekend in October, so I should be starting on the display Set Up that day as well! So from here till Oct, it will be working on the display items that will be new or updated for the show, maintenance on a few items, then getting the songs up to date with the new channel updates. Once all that is done, I can hopefully work on a new song or two for 2011. Since 2005 when I started to go big, this is the latest in the year I have started really working on things. It has been a VERY BUSY year, but I am thankful to be able to grumble a bit about that. Others are not so fortunate. We should start having pretty regular updates from here on out so keep checking back!

7-6-11 - Greetings now from Nashville, Music City. It is also my B-day too. We have had a great trip so far. The Expo went very well, and the attendance was great. My sessions went better than I anticipated. I had close to 125-150 in all 3 sessions. I am amazed at the energy that is exuded at these gatherings. I got to meet a lot of folks finally that I have known for years online. That is a treat for sure. Plus I got to hang out with some absolutely phenomenal individuals like the Monkhouse's, Mike Ziemkowski, Darren Huffty, Carson Williams (yes thee Carson Williams), Michael Simmons (CBS Early Shows voted best display in America), Kevin Dunn(The Demented Elf) and others! The education material was awesome, it was great to finally meet some vendors that I have worked with for years, like Laurie Reinder of Reinder's Lighting. Plus seeing others I have met before, like Paul Sessel, Dan Baldwin and others. Just a great time. Now we are enjoying my niece Michelle, nephew-in-law Robert, Alyssa and Kaitlyn. Chillin, been on the lake, water skiing and relaxing, shopping in downtown, and maybe the new Pirates movie this afternoon. It is nice to get some needed down time. I have a lot of ideas roaming around my head. As soon as I get back, I will start to pencil in the "plan" and get moving on a few things. I may implement the long desire of mine to get video into the display. I need to see if that will come to reality next week. More to come.......

7-2-11 - Greeting from Gatlinburg, TN and the Christmas Expo. Having breakfast with Jackie Monkhouse and pushing this out. What a great turn out and conference. Outstanding. More of an update later. I am running over the the Convention Center to get ready for my Curtain Strobe Session.

6-26-11 - Pppsssttt! Can you hear that? I can! It's the sound of an adult beverage being snapped open. While Friday was supposed to be my last day at work for 2 weeks, I had some MBO stuff to work on this weekend a bit, and I am done for now. Then tomorrow, Monday, in the morning, while technically enjoying my Memorial Day Holiday, I have about an hour of "work" to do, then it's R&R time! We look to pack, get organized for our trip to Tennessee, meet with some Light Crazies for dinner, then catch the big bird to the Volunteer State. We spend one quick night with my Niece, Nephew-in-law and family. Then off to Gatlinburg for Christmas Expo! I am REALLY looking forward to the time off. Now, the Golden Girls are already suspecting something is up. Stuff all over my Home Office, Carry Bags, suitcases are out and about, they know, and are PO'd. They do get upset when I leave, and with Tracy too, they will be really mad. Tonight I have to rip some DVDs for Tracy to put on her iTouch, I should do some for me as well. I need to do a final test on my sample DMX Universe traveling with me as part of my Class I will be teaching. All my presentation material is done, pushed to my "Show Computer", which is my personal laptop to boot. I had to update the laptop to sync it with my regular home computer for any file or material I need while at Expo. OK, so on the home front, I had the worst mowing session of the season both Thurs & Friday. I spent a total of almost 4 hours mowing between the 2 days. The grass is growing, getting longer, and it was Wet, WEt, WET! due to rain. Fortunately for this year that was the only bad session. I have also been playing Bill Murray in Caddyshack, fighting moles in the yard too. I suspected I had 2. One on the east side of the yard, and one on the west (you never fully know till you catch one, because they travel fast!). Well, I caught the East Side Mole yesterday, Woo-Hoo!. Not sure if he was the only one, (I suspected not, as the West side I think is a pup). This morning I confirmed it. West Side Mole is real and still wreaking havoc. He has alluded me now for 4 weeks :( I am almost ready to break out the C4 for him! Next update will be from Gatlinburg!

6-14-11 - Greetings! I am back from China. 12 days, 3 cities (Shanghai, Beijing, Shenzhen) and basically non-stop work. I did get a chance in Beijing to see the Great Wall again. It is really an amazing site, considering the Chinese have exploited it into a tourist trap, even so, just the thought of complexity, history, length, time to build etc.. is mind blowing. Now that I am back, I am splitting a lot of time. Work is still very busy, but I have to get many things accomplished. First, my material for the upcoming Christmas Expo in Gatlinburg. The majority of the information on my presentation topics is done. I am looking to refine the Power Points and I am waiting on some props to be delivered to take along with me. Thanks goes to my buddies Kevin Thomas and Pete Peters who have provided time and effort to help me with my Curtain Strobe material. As of now, that subject is the one that will require the most refining. This weekend, Tracy and I will head to L.A. for a visit with my Mom. Plus I will be getting a visit here in Seattle from my younger Brother Paul and his family. So it is going to be action packed before we jump on the plane to head to Tennessee. It will be good to get all the visits in for sure. I have thought a bit about my own display. Mainly around the one change, that being my Mega Tree Balls from 4 strings of red, green, blue and white to strings of RGB Balls that should help the look of that tree. The major overhaul on the Mega Tree is now put off until 2012 when things settle down on both the hardware and software fronts for the Intelligent RGB Pixels strings that will replace the current mini lights. Here very soon, I have to complete the display update to get a new channel map so that I can get a new song or 2 sequenced, and then update all the old songs. Then there is all the Summer house projects, PLUS I promised my Bro-in-law, Mark Marcell, (yes another Mark) a landscape bridge for his house on Lake Cle Elum. Too many things to do and not enough time. Check back, more updates coming.

5-18-11 - The local Christmas get together went awesome! Mother Nature gave us a glorious day (right up to the end), but we had lunch by the lake in the sunshine! The Foley's have a beautiful spot right on Lake St. Clair in Lacey. Spectacular. The day was a huge success and it helped that I walked away with the big Door Prize donated by Light O Rama, another 16 channel controller, Whoo-Hoo! I never win anything. You had to be there for that moment. My partner in arms and fellow Master of Ceremonies set it up perfectly. Nancy Foley drew the winning number, so it was all above board too. After that I got motivated to start my Christmas Expo, DMX material and that presentation is all but done now. Unfortunately, the motivation the get together generates had to be put on hold. Work and my China trip are on the priority list to get out of the way. However today, after a customer meeting, and a bear of a week, (and it is only Thursday), I hit Costco. Tracy and I wanted one of the hammocks they are selling, so I bought one, set it up, grabbed a nice cold beverage, and chilled for a bit. Tracy posted on her Facebook page the sheer relaxation I enjoyed for all of 30 minutes. It felt great. Now back to work and the grind for a while. It looks like it will be July before I start working on Christmas 2011 at this point. A few things are getting done though. I bought some acrylic globes for the new R-G-B balls that will go in the Mega Tree, so a few minor things are moving. I leave for China on Tuesday for 12 days. We will pick up after that trip. Enjoy! It looks like Spring is wanting to come around finally.

5-12-11 - Well we are just 2 days from our local Christmas get together, what we call a Mini PLUS. The name is confusing, but those associated with Planet Christmas at all, understand that this is just a local Christmas Crazy gathering. Work has not really let up for me, and has actually been exacerbated with my annual China trip cropping in this month. I had plenty to do before that trip came up, and now a LOT more to do to prep, plan and execute a 2 week, 3 city, Shanghai, Beijing and Shenzhen. This will be my first time to Shenzhen, although I was in Hong Kong a few decades ago. Shenzhen is just across the bay from Hong Kong. Anyway, our local meeting for me my part is pretty much done. I had a business trip get postponed that would have been today and tomorrow, so that helped with work AND my Mini prep. Woo-Hoo! It has been a VERY busy year, so there has been very little Christmas work going on. Even my weekends have been mainly dedicated to Work, work. It was only yesterday that I felt that familiar yearn and warmed feeling that the display brings me. I will be presenting a RGB Flood topic. So I have a small little network set up to show off some Do It Yourself Floods, as well as my commercial Chauvet 200B that I use in my display. It was fun to get my hands dirty again so to speak with connecting things together and troubleshooting items. My material will be pushed to my How-To section once the Mini is complete. While I am in China most likely is when I will focus on my Christmas Expo material that needs to be done for the end of June in Gatlinburg. We have dog woos as well. Over the weekend, we found a tumor on Jazmine's hind leg. I am all too familiar with these from my buddy Bruce Lobree, my Sunday morning dog walking friend. His Japanese Kai had/has a cancerous tumor in the exact same spot. So off to the vet we went on Monday. Turns out it is benign. We heard that same term wtih Deeogee this past summer if you remember. As long as it benign, we can deal with it. Anyway, Jaz had surgery yesterday to remove the tumor, actually a cyst from her leg. There is not a lot of "meat" in that area, and they wanted to get it all our, so they had to make a patchwork membrane to assist with the healing and closing of the gap that the wound has. So she is now is a period of recovering from that ordeal, which will be 3-4 weeks. We got her in asap, so that I can be here for the first part of her recovery before I head off to China. I will provide an update after Saturday.

4-9-11 - I just got back from a 10 day travel stint. 3 days with Mom in L.A. to get her taxes done, then home for a few hours before jumping on a plane last Sunday to Boston for some internal training for work. We gathered our entire world wide staff and channel partners. Always a fun week, but a lot of work to boot. Just before I got out of town, the LED light order hit the doorstep. So one item down for the season. I am already seeing that this year is going to be busy at work. There is a lot of projects to do here at the house. So I am already dialing back on growth for the display. Time is going to be tough this year. I will add some R-G-B balls to replace the current scheme in the Mega Tree, update the Mega Forest to R-G-B-W a few minor updates to other items, add 2 songs and that is the plan already. I started working on my PLUS presentations for Gatlinburg. I have 3 topics, Curtain Strobe Repair, DMX Basics and DMX Practical. Thankfully I can take stuff I already have, partition it up, add some things and be good to go. Our local Mini is starting to heat up, as that date is May 14th and quickly approaching. So overall, not a lot happening right now, but things are at least moving in the right direction.

3-17-10 - Happy St. Patty's Day! With a name like Zembruski, you would not think Irish. But, today I get to celebrate as a true countryman. Wearing green, and, ah, um, partaking in a green adult beverage, or 2. Yes, I found out later in life that Irish is in my heritage. Much to my Mom's denial, I have cousin and Uncle who confirmed that fact (on St Patty's Day many years ago). What's that got to do with Christmas you ask? Nothing. Which, by the way, is almost what I have had the chance to do lately on that topic. Not out of desire I might add. Work has been a priority with many, many demands on my time. I had 2 years of reduced travel, and I can already see where this year is going to be very busy. So my focus has been on work, (since it pays for the Christmas Hobby). If you have not heard, the weather in the PacNW has been wet, Wet, WET. So working on Saturday and Sundays lately have not been too bad. There have been a few minor things I have done with Christmas in mind. This week, I made my arrangements to attend Planet Christmas's PLUS+ or Christmas Expo, or whatever Planet Christmas is calling it this week. I did meet with the Education Committee of PLUS+, which is comprised of 2 awesome individuals, Walter and Jackie Monkhouse of Louisiana. So I will be doing 3 sessions. This convention is JUST before the 4th of July in Gatlinburg TN, a most sought after tourist trap during the summer, let along that exact time of year. Yeah, there is a touch or sarcasm in statement. Hotels are at a premium, thankfully I could use points, airfare, I don't even want to talk about. There are no deals flying into that part of the US that time of year. We will leave it at that. The one great fact of the trip, is that Tracy and I will get to spend time with my niece, her family and hopefully other family members. So outside of this, I have only ordered a few miscellaneous items for display additions this next year. Heck, my garage is not even fully cleaned up with Christmas stuff that needs testing, fixing and organizing before it gets put away. The plan is going to be to add a few RBG elements (Red-Green-Blue), which is all the rage. These items will be in my DMX universe, and will add to the display some, but more importantly, set me up for 2012, when I will get WAY more immersed in RGB effects and items. What does this mean? One color scheme for our display is the fact that I can make items all Red, Blue Green or White. Using RGB elements allows me to do that WAY more efficiently. The goal is to add 4 new songs to our line up. So work on that needs to start very soon. OK, so the updates this time of year are spread out and get a bit lengthy. So for now, I will sign off. Check back, I will attempt to get a post in before mid April, ugh, TAXES............!

2-20-11 - Hola, Buenos Dias, me amigos! Back from Mazatlan and getting caught up on a lazy, sunny Sunday. We got home late last night, and while we had a phenomenal time, it is nice to get back. The Golden Girls, Jazmine and Deeogee sure were PO'd at us, but they got over it pretty quickly and were very happy to see us home. I did not get a chance to provide an update before we left. I got tossed a project deadline I was NOT expecting at work. So my visit with Mom and the Super Bowl turned out to be a working weekend. When I got home from L.A., it was 3 days of little sleep to get things done for work, and what needed to get done just to leave for a week. Tracy and I poured ourselves onto the plane and slept to L.A., and were lucky enough to get upgraded to first class on into Mazatlan. We love our timeshare in Mazatlan, and truly, all we did was relax by the pool, enjoy the company of Rick and Darla Allison our friends, and soak up some badly needed sun, and siesta time. Rick has had a rough time at work as well, so most nights we were in bed by 9 or 10 to help recharge. I managed a few spare minutes to ensure the LED order got submitted, albeit by mail at around 1am in the morning! Today I am getting the yard cleaned up a bit, and going to take the Golden Girls on a long walk down at the river by our house, one of their favorite places. It is pretty cold today in Seattle, but the sun is out. I was approached today to be an instructor at our gathering in Gatlinburg this summer, so we will see what that is all about this week I am sure. Being off tomorrow, that will give me a chance to catch up at work a bit, then maybe get some things squared away in the garage.

Genesis 1:14-15

And God said, “Let there be lights in the expanse of the sky, to separate the day from the night, and let them serve as signs to mark seasons and days and years, and let them be lights in the expanse of the sky to give light on the earth