Putting Together a Neighborhood Christmas Lights Tour

Decorating your house in Christmas lights is just as much of a yearly tradition as decorating the Christmas tree. With each house decked out in a myriad of colors, patterns and displays, walking through the neighborhood is an event in and of itself. While meandering the sidewalks on your own can be exciting, organizing a Christmas lights tour for a small group of people can really enhance the neighborly Christmas spirit. Plus, you can have loads of fun while doing so!

1. Any event takes lots of hard work and time that most people don't have. Round up a few neighborhood friends to help you with the planning. Dividing up responsibilities and tasks ensures that you aren't overwhelmed and makes sure that you can focus and put all of your effort into the handful of tasks that are yours to take care of.

2. In order to organize a neighborhood Christmas lights tour, you first need to find some spectacular light displays. Take a walk around your neighborhood one night and look for houses that have gone above and beyond with their decorating. Jot down the addresses of 10 to 12 houses that you think would be a good choice for the Christmas lights tour. Can't find any good houses in your neighborhood? Go to the next neighborhood or one town over.

3. Create a map of your neighborhood or the neighborhood you've chosen to host the Christmas lights tour. By creating a map, you'll have an easier time in plotting out your tour route. There are many map websites available, such as MapQuest, to help you in routing your tour. On the MapQuest website, all you need to do to pull up a map of your neighborhood is to enter the city, state, and zip code in the appropriate boxes. Press, "Get Map," and the website will take you to a map of your city. Next, use the arrows and the zoom in and zoom out buttons to zero in on the section of the neighborhood that you are using for your tour. At the top left of the page is the print button. Pressing this will take you to a printer-friendly version of your map. Print this out and use a highlighter or a marker to trace your planned route, indicating where each house will be on the route.

4. Send out invitations for your neighborhood Christmas lights tour. You can create them using card stock and they can be handwritten or typed on the computer. Make sure you include the date, time, and meeting place where you want the people going on the tour to all meet. Your designated meeting place should be at or near the beginning of the tour. Once your invitations are finished, you can either mail them out, or hand deliver them. Hand delivering them adds a personal touch, and saves you money on stamps, but does require a little extra time.

5. Do you have a long list of people wanting to go on your Christmas lights tour? Hold more than one tour! Your tours just may catch on and become a yearly event!

6. A day or two before the tour, walk through your planned route, making sure pathways are shoveled if snow has fallen. If there are some walkways that have not been shoveled, or if they're icy, take a shovel and clear them yourself and sprinkle salt to melt any ice. Before you do so, however, do let the homeowner know what you're doing. Although, most people will be more than willing to let somebody else shovel and salt their front sidewalk. If you don't have the time to do this on your own, and you have some extra money, hire some neighborhood kids to do the shoveling and salting for you.

7. For any event, snacks are a must. Hot chocolate can easily be transported in a few thermoses. Additionally, you can ask each tour guest to bring a sweet treat to pass around during the tour, such as cookies or candies. Just make sure that you don't leave a trail of debris in your wake.

8. Pick somebody to be the designated tour guide. This person can lead the tour, announce each house as it comes, and offer up a few interesting facts about each Christmas lights display. Prior to the tour, ask any homeowners to divulge any curious tidbits or funny stories about their light displays.

9. Do you enjoy caroling? Combine your Christmas lights tour with caroling. Print up the lyrics to a few holiday songs, such as Silent Night or Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, and pass them out at the beginning of the tour.

10. At the end of the tour, consider convening back at someone's house for warm drinks and more snacks. Hot chocolate, egg nog, and coffee are popular holiday choices for beverages while Christmas cookies and candies would be good options for end-of-tour snacks. Turn on some Christmas music, gather around a fireplace, and chat for the rest of the night.