You can't see it, but the garage is filled with animatronics. Plus the decorations span around the corner and across the street.
Growing up, I was kind of embarrassed by it all. At school, I'd hear people saying "Hey, did you see that one house?". Inevitably, it would be mine. Come Halloween and Christmas, we'd start getting a parade of cars down the cul-de-sac, all stopping to stare at our house weeks before the holiday. Sometimes, people would even come out of their cars and take photos.
my father loved it. He still does actually. The fact he gives out king sized candy bars and "tricks" probably doesn't help the traffic flow on Halloween. Friends and neighbors conspire with him to knock on windows, dressed as Santa to delight (or terrify in some cases) their kids on Christmas Eve.
As I grew older, I became more accepting of the decorations. Instead, I found myself comparing other decorations to our own. A certain house in the other side of my home town even has a website for their Christmas decorations, but I think it pales in comparison to ours. Theirs lacks the eclectic aura of all the mismatched decorations, accumulated throughout the years. What do they have instead? Lights synced to radio. And not even a lot of lights. We used to know a family who would wrap their entire house in lights for Christmas. Now that was dedication.
Okay, obviously I'm biased here, so take my criticism with a grain of salt. Or with a barrel considering it is probably pretty cool. You know, if you're into that sort of thing.
About when I hit high school, my mom and I struck back with our own Holiday ambitions. A family friend "egged" our house one year. Considering we already had a patch of giant eggs and little ones hanging from trees, this was quite a feat. Our front lawn was absolutely covered in them. There was even one left labeled for "Goon" (I have no idea where this came from, but that's what that family calls him. I suspect it dates back to when he first started playing hockey). Inside was a lump of coal- naturally.
The next year, my mom and I sprung into action. We woke up at the crack of dawn (or butt crack, as she calls it) and egged their house first. Haha! We were victorious!
From there, it spread. We egged friends and neighbors houses. We egged our own house. We even got egged quite a few times (and in one time in particular, so did my car). Again, these were all brightly colored plastic eggs with candy inside- not actual eggs. My mom and I would happily go to IHOP for breakfast, an extremely rare occurrence. It was worth waking up at freakish hours for. Upon coming home, my mom would putter around the house and I would collapse and go back to sleep until my sister woke me up again to "help" her get the eggs. It usually ended in me standing in the rain picking them up while she and my mom giggled on our front porch. There are pictures to prove this.
The tradition has been slowly dwindling down as the kids we know are growing older and no longer believe in the Easter bunny. Soon, even my sister won't be interested in finding eggs either. I lost my finding rights about when she started developing hers. At least I had egging to take its place.
Now Easter is my favorite holiday. There's candy, there's cute cuddly animals, and best of all, there's IHOP. One of my favorite movies is Easter Parade even. If I went to Church, you can bet I'd be wearing a fabulous hat and dress combo.
I'm not sure what I'll do as I grow even older. I'm sure after we graduate, most of my friends will scatter, and I don't know myself where I'll end up. So I'm taking advantage now of my favorite holiday. Last year I knit more than a few projects and I expect next year, there will be more. And my hell and high water, if I ever buy a house with a tree in front yard, there will be eggs hanging from it.
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