Christmas displays at Maryland town started small, now 'insane' with cheer
PITTSVILLE, Md. (AP) — Two Pittsville families have united this holiday season as Christmas Town and the Nick Family Christmas Light Show will be in the same place in Pittsville for people of all ages to see.
The lights will turn on each night at 6 Monday through Sunday, and there will be three shows a night from Friday to Sunday.
Last year was the first for Bill Nick and Carol Juba's Christmas light show. Marsha and Mike Newton invited them to set up the light show at their house since it's a better location.
"They weren't getting a lot of traffic because there's not a lot of places for people to park. That's why we invited them to come over here with us," Newton said.
"I thought it was a great idea because we're all after the same thing: making the kids and families in the community happy for Christmas," Juba said.
Walkthrough Christmas display — with cookies and hot chocolate
The Newtons decorate the outside of their home with more than 100,000 lights, 531 Christmas-themed blow molds, animatronics, a train ride and more to create their annual Christmas Town display.
Christmas Town is a free walkthrough display that will include free cookies, fudge, punch and hot chocolate for visitors to enjoy as they walk around the display and watch the light show. Children will also find a mailbox to send their letters to Santa.
"We're just trying to become a tradition so to speak for families in the area. I want everybody to know that they can come here and spend the entire three hours we're open with their kids to have a wonderful time and not have to worry about spending a penny," Newton said.
Gertrude the pink flamingo wearing a Santa hat and a blue and white striped scarf is a decoration that will move around the display. The first child to find it each night will win a pink flamingo lollipop.
"We are the largest vintage walkthrough in the area," Newton said. "We have decorations from the late 1800s, all the way up to new."
The oldest is a sleigh from 1887 that was used in a Christmas parade in Delaware until the 1960s.
"We allow people to get into it with their families and take pictures," she said.
Last year, there was even a proposal on the sleigh.
One of the new additions in Christmas Town this year are the flying reindeer attached to the old sleigh.
How the tradition began
After the Newtons married nine years ago, Mike decided he was going to start decorating the yard for Christmas.
"Then I started helping him and it just got bigger and bigger and bigger, and now it's like insane," Newton said.
Twice a year they go to Virginia on vacation just to buy blow molds.
"We take his truck and when we come back, we look like the Beverly Hillbilles because everything is packed and stacked. It's a hot mess," she said.
The family never imagined that their display would get thousands of visitors each year — so many that the road around their home is barely visible with all the parked cars there to see the lights.
It's busiest at the walkthrough display on the weekend, but much quieter during the week.
Newton said during those days they will have older couples walk around for hours holding hands as they take in the Christmas lights.
"It's so adorable," she said. "You can see that they're reliving memories from decades before. It's cute."
Christmas Town has a small train that children can ride on the weekends.
"But we have families that have special needs kids that come four or five days a week. For those special kids, Mike will come out during the week, to start the train and let them take rides" she said.
A year's planning goes into light show
The Nick Family Light Show will feature a 40- to 45-minute light show Friday through Sunday and a show on opening night. There will be three shows each day it runs.
On Saturdays, the light show will feature a Disney Spectacular with characters from "Frozen" performing a skit along with the lights.
The light shows on Friday and Sunday will feature upbeat Christmas songs.
Bill Nick started planning and designing this year's light show Christmas Eve last year. He has spent hundreds of hours programming the lights.
This year, the light show is adding club lighting, rotating lights, LED pictures, fog machines and flame machines.
"We have all kinds of stuff going on," Nick said. "These are real flames that can come out of these machines. They're gonna go up 30 feet."
Nick doesn't have a background in electronics, programming or computers. He started out doing traditional lights in his yard for the neighborhood to view.
"I kept watching these videos online and I got to know a couple of the guys that actually do it. They convinced me to give it a shot," he said.
When it comes to putting on the light show, it was all pretty much self-taught. He studied and when needed, he went to his mentors for help.
"It's just been a hobby now, you know. It's an expensive hobby, but it's a hobby," he said.
Last year, Nick just had a small house in his yard as the focal point.
"This year we decided to go a whole lot bigger and add a whole bunch of different equipment because when you start adding all that club lighting and DMX pictures, that's a whole different ballgame," he said.
The light show stage is centered on a castle and two trees Nick built. There will be chairs set up.
Any money donated at the display will go to supporting children with terminal illnesses. They will be purchasing gifts to take to hospitals and organizations like TidalHealth and Believe in Tomorrow's House by the Sea.
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