The 10th Annual Ceremony of the Lights

My boys, greeting the large crowd gathered for the special occasion!

 Ten years ago, on my second date with Danny, we visited his Grandma and Grandpa Korth and decorated their patio and deck with Christmas lights. You see, their neighbors went all-out on the Christmas light displays (the Ogren's house used to rival the Thanksgiving Point light show!) -- and Danny and I felt like Grandma and Grandpa needed some lights too. When we'd completed the lights, we held a special lighting ceremony, where we welcomed the thousands of imaginary guests who'd come to see Grandma and Grandpa's spectacular lights. Grandma sang a solo (O Holy Night), I performed an impromptu Christmas dance (it must've won Danny's heart...), Grandpa gave a Christmas speech, and Danny stood on a chair and was a booming loud master of ceremonies. 

Well, a marriage, 4.5 kids, and ten years later -- we've kept the lighting ceremony tradition alive. I'm pretty sure that we've never missed a year of decorating Grandma and Grandpa's deck. And we still have huge crowds who come to see our special lighting program! :) This year was an especially cold one, but we still managed to make it happen. Look how festive their deck is now!

Macie and Reid sang a lovely Chinese song as part of the program.

Every year Grandma Korth delights us with her operatic solo of "O Holy Night"

This year Davis was the lucky one who got the flip the light switch on and illuminate the night!

We finished off the evening with Grandma's dream bars and rootbeer floats, which were served at that very first lighting ceremony in 2001! We love this Christmas tradition, and hope to keep it alive for a LONG time!

Here's a clip of Grandpa's speech (very short, but sweet) this year! Merry Christmas!