Snoopy and Mr. Christmas

I don't know if this is a small town tradition, or if our suburban neighbors do it too, but during the Christmas season Nathan and I drive around the several neighborhoods surrounding our little apartment in search of pretty or outrageous lights displays.

We have seen several of both. One of my favorites is the house in which strands of white lights are draped over the driveway, beginning at the top of the garage and streaming downwards to either side of the driveway. However, there are two that take the cake for us.

The first we saw last year as we were driving around. I'm not usually one for inflatables, but I am a big Peanuts fan and the sight of this inflatable just made me happy. It's an inflatable Snoopy on Sopwith Camel with rotating propeller (said just that way as quickly as possible.) Nathan also gets a big kick out of it. The house's owners also put out a little blinking runway for him. Unfortunately, every time we go to see him, we forget the camera and when we went around taking pictures today, he had already been taken down.

The second favorite house is one Nathan affectionately calls "Mr. Christmas." We didn't see this house until this year and his title didn't occur until we were looking at lights with Elizabeth and noted that for a few blocks on almost all sides of this house, there are very few lights. "Must be another rolling brownout from Mr. Christmas," Nathan commented. A nickname was born. It truly is a fantastic sight. Every time we pass it I want to laugh. Of course, the pictures don't really do it justice. He has cut outs of the Flintstones in the front yard...I'm still not sure what they have to do with Christmas.
There were also lights strung across the sides of the house.

It's impossible to see in these pictures, but there was a functioning Ferris wheel, as well as two miniature villages set up inside.