Helpful hints for stringing up holiday lights
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Helpful Hints for Stringing Up Holiday Lights (605 words, US, UK, CAN)
Chances are, when it comes to designing your Christmas lights display, you’re more like Chevy Chase as Clark Griswold than Bob Vila. But holiday decorating needn’t be a daunting task. Luckily, there is a bevy of products that can make designing your holiday decorations a lot easier.
For example, by simply visiting a Web site such as www.noveltylights.com, you can gain many great ideas for unique ways to decorate your home this holiday season. Products like the Walk Way Trees, 2-inch tall mini Christmas trees that light up and line your sidewalk while staying secured into the ground with easy-to-mount stakes, require little work to install but can give your home a unique look.
Similarly, net lights make decorating all those trees and hedges significantly easier than it used to be. Rather than forcing you to string together several different strands of lights to cover your hedges and trees, net lights are connected in one easy net (reducing your dependence on knotted up extension cords), requiring you to just unfold the net and drape it over your nearest hedge. Also, most of these lights allow you to connect three nets at once, making the decoration of a row of hedges or one long tree trunk markedly easier.
Rope lights have also made decorating the home, and taking those decorations down, a lot less stressful. Similar to a garden hose, rope lights typically come on a spool that makes the trying process of untangling holiday lights a thing of the past. They can be used in many locations where you’ve once used traditional lights.
After you’ve chosen the right design, make sure you’re careful in your use of holiday lights and decorations. According to the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC), each year, 12,500 people head to the emergency room with cuts, burns, shocks and falls, courtesy of incidents involving faulty holiday lights, dried-out Christmas trees, and other decorations. The following are some helpful hints from the CPSC for you to take into consideration before dusting off your lights, ladder and staple gun and heading to the roof.
? Product inspection agencies such as ETL Semko (formerly Edison Testing Laboratory) and UL (Underwriters Laboratories, Inc.) exist for a reason. Whether you’re buying indoor or outdoor lights, make sure your lights have the ETL or UL seal, which assures they meet safety standards and have been certified for their specific use (indoor or outdoor).
? Examine your lights, new or old. Broken or cracked sockets, frayed wires, or loose connections indicate that those lights should be thrown away. Also, if a bulb burns out, replace it immediately, as the remaining bulbs will burn hotter for each burned out bulb.
? Do not use electric lights on a metallic tree. This can lead to the tree becoming charged with electricity from faulty lights, potentially electrocuting anyone who touches a branch.
? When stringing lights outdoors, be careful to avoid power lines leading from utility poles into older homes.
? When fastening outdoor lights, do so only to trees, house walls, or other firm supports, and use only insulated staples (not nails or tacks) to hold strings in place.
? Always turn the lights off before going to sleep or leaving your home.