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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:

      Christmas village tips

      Here are a few tips that will make your next Christmas village scene a step above the rest. Polystyrene. Buy a few sheets of polystyrene from a hardware store. It…

      My search for the first snowman

      Who made the first snowman? Who first came up with the idea of placing one snowball atop another and sticking a carrot in the top sphere? This was my quest…

      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…

      Professional home display

      If you have the time to read this article then you either need more Christmas decorations to put out or you are a really organized enthusiast. Either way I am…

      Re-PLUS in Louisville

      It started out a simple enough idea back in late May. Our normal bi-annual gathering of serious Christmas decorators was not meant to be in this challenging economy. Instead, the…

      Revolution Evolution

      We all remember the time when we saw the light display that got us hooked. 35 years ago my parents took their eight year old to a nearby suburb where…

      Rumor mill ruminations

      What an interesting summer with the war of the Christmas shows, each on the same weekend of July in Conroe, Texas and Gatlinburg, Tennessee. This elf made it to both…

      More Christmas village tips

      Christmas villages began during the 1700’s with the Moravians building a Putz. What’s a Putz? It’s a display featuring the nativity and tells the story though different scenes about Mary…

      Top 10 music list for this upcoming holiday season

      At PlanetChristmas we get to see a lot of Christmas light displays and in our Spring 2015 issue we figured out the most popular tunes for 2014. We checked with…

      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…

      Then there are the rumors...

        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…

        The rumor mill

        I dragged my wife to the last performance of the Trans Siberian Orchestra 2009 concert tour. Jiminy Christmas! I’ve never…

        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…

        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

        Ahhhhh. The sound of wedding bells were recently heard in the Christmas decorating world. Our very own Melissa at Christmas…

        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…

        Here we go with the rumor mill

        This can’t be good. There’s been another data-dump onto the world from WikiLeaks. I just did a quick search for…

        The rumor mill grinds on

        When Santa isn’t looking we sneak off to the elf lounge and surf the Internet so we can keep up…

        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 has found more… rumors.

        Santa gave all the elves the afternoon off in early November so I wandered down to the well heated North…

        The rumor mill ends another year

        What’s the big decorating trend this year? I really hope it’s not those dress manikins shaped like Christmas trees. Creepy.…

        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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