We all have different ways to decorate for Christmas. Some of us enjoy the usage of lights more to express ourselves during the holiday season. Using multicolored lights for your outdoor Christmas decorating not only adds color to your exterior home surrounding, but they are also for your neighbors to enjoy in celebrating the festive season. Before you start to decorate your house with any lighting decorations, which is usually is a family affair, you need to determine how many light strings that you want to use in each package and whether it can be safely connected or not.
You must know that for each type of light, it is not always the same and if you exceed the maximum number of connection, you can blow a fuse or even trip your circuit breaker. If you still want to use a large number of lights, it is recommended that you use LED lighting which consuming lesser power than the normal type of bulb lights so that you would be able to connect more lights just by using a single circuit. Here’s how you decorate for Christmas with as many different types of lights as you want for your home and the outside of it.
What you need to do:
- Outdoor multicolored light strings
- Ladder
- Light clips
- Screwdriver
- Outdoor-rated extension cord
Method:
- Firstly, you need to layout your multicolored light strings near the location where you want to hang the lights. The common area that people usually hang Christmas lights is the roof line of your house, porch posts and walkways.
- Besides that, you must also make sure that you have a power outlet nearby to provide the electric supply for your lighting. If you are to hang onto two separate areas, you can split the lighting lines into two for instance one for the roof line and another one for your railings thus making it much easier to hang the lights later on.
- Before you start to hang the lights, you need to connect an extension cord (for outdoor use) onto your male string end and plug it into the power outlet.
- After that, you need to view your light strings, whether it looks too busy or not, because multicolored lights could become distracting to your eyes. If you notice that the laid-out lights look like a jumble, you should replace some of the strings with solid color strings that use a color from your multi-light string. For instance, you may keep the lightings that line your roof with multicolored strings, but try to choose red lights for your deck, green lights for your porch posts and blue lights for your walkway.
- Next step for you to do is to plug the lights back again once you have finished swapping out the strands and check its look again. If you are satisfied with the color layout, then its time for you to hang the lights to its location.
- If you do not wish to swap any of the lights, try to use multicolored lights more sparingly for example, line the roof and walkways before simply changing the porch light into colored bulb for a more festive look.
- When you hang the lights, you need to unplug the lighting strands first, and then place your ladder beneath the beginning of your laid-out light strings while the male end of your light must be brought up when you start to climb up the ladder. Next, you need to clip against the wooden overhang of your house roof and secure it to the wood by screwing it with the provided screw. Once finished, you need to place the light string neatly inside the clip.
- After that, you have to shift the ladder a few feet over the area and proceed to screw the next clip before placing your lighting string neatly into the clip. If you want the lights to swag, you just have to leave some slack or otherwise you need to pull its string tightly and straight.
- In order to make your lights hang according to your preferred way, you must place a light clip every 4 to 6 feet apart. Then, you should repeat it until every light string is in place and also ensure its end-to-end connections are firmly plugged in.
- Once you have finished, you need to plug your lights in and if you want to keep the extension cord in place, you have to use more light clips.
- Finally, if you notice that the color pattern is either too random or not to your liking, you can swap the light bulbs using the spare bulbs with different colors or from other parts of your light string.
Additional Reading:
Let There Be Lights!: A Beginner’s Guide to Outdoor Christmas Decorating
