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    We’ve made it too complicated!

    Remember chaser strings from long ago?  Wrap one of those around your Christmas tree and suddenly it had personality.  The string had a controller at the end about the size…

    PlanetChristmas is back in 2023!

    Here’s a short video (just over a minute) that shows the highlights of PlanetChristmas 2023. The last major light display at the PlanetChristmas world headquarters in Franklin, Tennessee was way…

    A Better/Cheaper RGB Pixel Matrix Solution?

    I’ve been thinking about adding some sort of pixel matrix to my Christmas display so I could do more messages, graphics and video.  A P10 RGB panel display or pixel…

    Thinking about RGB pixels?

    Back in the old days you would plug in a string of Christmas lights and they would just turn on.  Easy. Technology started getting involved about a decade ago. Think…

    Make your own wireframe for the yard

    Ready to create your own wireframes to continue the theme you have evolving in your Christmas display?  You can always go to a local welding shop but it gets expensive…

    How to fix a blow mold?

    Does your Christmas blow mold need some tender-loving care?  John Yanik created an excellent video to guide you through the process.  Check it out! Standby while we load this from…

    How do they make Christmas lights?

    So, how does the factory make a string of Christmas Lights?  It really helps to have a specialized machine and a lot of automation.  This YouTube video is a bit…

    Holiday Lights at Cheekwood Trains 2022

    What happens when you mix a giant model trains layout with Christmas lights dancing to the music?  You end up with Holiday Lights down at the TRAINS! display at Cheekwood…

    2022 Top 10 Christmas tunes list

    At PlanetChristmas we get to see a lot of Christmas displays. We also talk to music producers, programmers and radio DJs about what they think will be hot come Christmas…

    Be a good Santa

    I had the pleasure of attending the “Celebrate Santa” convention back in March of this year. There were about 400 portly gentlemen attending to trade secrets on how to be…

    The Forums are back!

    It was 1997 when the Internet was relatively new and the PlanetChristmas.com domain had just been granted. Back then you filled out a paper form, mailed it in and waited…

    TSO keeps going and going and going

    Trans-Siberian Orchestra reveals 2022 holiday tour dates and answers your burning questions by Melissa Ruggieri of USA TODAY Rare is the juggernaut as potent as Trans-Siberian Orchestra. The musical locomotive…

    Really worth reading...

    Some of our favorite articles:

      Indoor decorating

      It’s getting really close to setup time. I’ve been working on my indoor display since the middle of September. The trees are up and in place, but not completely decorated…

      The rumor mill never stops

      Been hearing some weird rumors from participants in the 2014 version of ABC’s Great Christmas Light Fight. Decorating started sometime during the second week in September with final judging three…

      The largest computerized Christmas tree in the world

      How does one construct the largest artificial foliage Christmas tree in the world? Bi-Lingual-ly of course! But I’m getting ahead of myself . . . . Let’s start at the…

      So many LED based Christmas lights

      I’m not worried. Well, maybe a little. It’s been the oddest thing. Until this year we’ve been quite self-sufficient at the North Pole. When we needed raw material to build…

      What makes us go crazy for Christmas lights?

      My first exposure to the idea of animated Christmas lights was from Carson Williams’ Wizards in Winter video that went viral back in 2005. I thought it was cool, but…

      Getting into synchronized lighting

      Over-the-top decorators with computerized displays are constantly being asked “How did you do that?” When we answer “I spent three weeks setting up everything in the yard and another three…

      More views from the UK

      One of my other hobbies is oil painting. I create landscapes and abstracts in oils purely for my own pleasure. I was talking with a friend at an art exhibition…

      Synchronized Lighting Heads and Skeletons

      I feel it’s time to talk about Halloween in PlanetChristmas magazine. More and more people are decorating for the last day of October and many of the techniques are also…

      Sequencing >1000 channels

      I’ve been running around the world the last few months so I didn’t get to write this column in the last edition. Luckily I was able to tell the story…

      Geek my tree

      An interesting thing happened this past Christmas. After retiring my show I got bored and needed to find something to do. I decided to decorate my 12’ Christmas tree with…

      Then there are the rumors...

        The Rumor Mill

        We get satellite TV in the workshop up here at the North Pole. Ernie (the super-geeky elf: think thick glasses,…

        The rumor mill again

        Government overthrows, earthquakes, tsunamis, nuclear meltdowns. What in the world is going on with everyone down south? Sounds like the…

        Rumor mill ruminations

        What an interesting summer with the war of the Christmas shows, each on the same weekend of July in Conroe,…

        The Rumor Mill is working overtime

        The big man in red gave us a night off. We aimed the satellite dish toward Europe and the TV…

        The Grinch again

        Mrs. Grinch conned me into watching “Invasion of the Christmas Lights” on some cable channel last weekend. What is wrong…

        Marking your territory

        There’s a morgue under the house according to my wife. It’s where I store most of the Christmas decorations because…

        Rumor mill

        I have a normal eared brother that lives way down south. He’s a Christmas amateur, meaning he only thinks about…

        So many LED based Christmas lights

        I’m not worried. Well, maybe a little. It’s been the oddest thing. Until this year we’ve been quite self-sufficient at…

        The Grinch…

        When it comes to “Do-it-Yourself” wizardry, I don’t think you will find a more creative bunch of people than those…

        The Rumor Mill (again)

        Labor Day. It’s typically when the politicians kick into high gear. How can you tell when one isn’t telling the…

        More from the rumor mill

        Microsoft has determined the attention span of a human is eight seconds. Mythbusters figured out a goldfish can stay focused…

        The Rumor Mill keeps grinding it out

        Santa gave us Labor Day off with one little caveat. We had to promise to return the next day ready…

        Where are the forums?

        The PlanetChristmas Forums are on an extended sabbatical. 

        If you want to engage with the decorating community, head on over to our Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/groups/planetchristmas

        If you really want to see the PlanetChristmas Forums come back on-line, send an email to Chuck (chuck at planetchristmas.com)

        No matter what, remember our three rules.  We are:

        1. Positive
        2. Family Friendly
        3. Christmas-centric
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