Came by and saw your display...Great job for your first year! Big learning curve for the first year. I live near Holly Hills and Gravois on Lavernell Ct and run a 128 Ch display. Been slowly growing it for about 10 years. My website is http://www.lavernelllights.info if you want to take a look at the videos. Good to see another local display. I did a flyer this year about local displays, but didn't know about yours until after the flyer is done. I'll try remember to add your display next year.
Great to hear from you. Your display is awesome! Love the snow men! I wish I had a larger yard to add animation.
I am planning on adding 64 more channels, 4 mini trees, Zara Radio and a better FM Transmitter. I have been thinking about a mega tree but I probably will wait until 2011.
I was completely taken by surprise at the number of visiters. We were having traffic issues so I fnally had to cut the show to about 8 minutes.
Which transmitter do you currently have? I've been using a Ramsey FM25B. If I come up with some spare cash (yea, right!), I'd like to get the EDM transmitter with RDS....I've heard good things about that one. I'm going to add a few more controllers myself - thinking about several things, including a 20' megatree. My current one is 10'. I'm not sure yet if the 20' will go in my yard or the neighbor's....kinda depends on if I need to concrete a pipe in or not!
The neighbor 2 doors down told me to keep on coming down - not sure if he was serious or not, but I've been thinking about that too. I'm looking at maybe adding some wood cutouts or something to fill that hill on the west side of my property. I've got lots of ideas, but implementing them all will be a bit too expensive, especially with a new baby!
Your display looked great for your first year - now that the learning curve is behind you, you'll have even better luck next year. Location is a very important part. Luck for you, St. Louis Hills is pretty light friendly, but if traffic gets too bad, you might have issues. I know there is one guy in St. Charles that has had problems with traffic and one neighbor that is complaining. He's taking next year off, but hopefully returning in 2011. I'm very fortunate in that with a cul-de-sac, we don't have the through traffic, so it will be a bit longer before there are traffic issues. I'm envisioning one day the whole block decorating. I'd love to be the first block in St. Louis that has an entirely synchronized block!
Last edited on Tue Feb 9th, 2010 12:32 pm by tomskillman
Thanks Tom. When we moved here 5 years ago, the Christmas light displays were pretty minimal. I started adding more and more lights and the neighbors responded. Now everybody has a display.
My next door neighbor asked me if I would like to incorporate her yard into my display. I would love to do it but I barely have enough time to do my own display. All of my neighbors have been extremely supportive and I have not heard a single complaint.
I have been using a whole house FM transmitter that gave me coverage over the whole block. I am going to upgrade so I can transmit to the whole neighborhood and possibly coordinate with Candy Cane Lane on Murdoch. (There is a house for sale on Candy Cane Lane and I was considering buying it and moving so I could be in the middle of the insanity but the wife veto'd).
The whole block synchronized has been a dream of mine. Even a simple single channel for every house would be cool over 8 houses. Ahh to dream!
Congrats on the new baby! I say buy new toys while you can because the kids don't get any cheaper as they get older. I can't wait until my 3 year old can help me with the display especially when he is old enough to climb the ladder!
Just a note on the FM transmitter - I have heard good and bad about the whole house transmitter. If you're covering the whole block, then you're already technically over the limit the FCC puts on unlicensed stations. Not that they're going to do much unless someone complains, but there are a couple of threads on here where they did actually show up at someone's house and ask them to turn the transmitter off....and that was using a Ramsey, I believe!
