Christmas Lights

I love Christmas lights...although I don't enjoy putting them up or taking them down. In fact, after last season, I left the lights in the bushes. Tonight I decided to hook everything up and see what worked. As you know, I firmly believe there is a scam and that Christmas lights basically only work 1 year. So I started looking for my timers...and couldn't find them. I found the extension cords and the outside Christmas extras, but no timers. After walking back and forth from basement garden room (where they should have been) to the garage (where they might have been) with a few steps in between (you never know where they could wind up) I finally had a thought. I looked at the outlets where I would plug them in and....there they were, still attached to the house. Sigh. I flicked switches and took a look. Actually, a good percentage of the lights came on-although the colors were definitely muted. The East side of the house is all set. The main outages were on the corner as the bushes go around the West side of the house. I picked up a few packages of lights and, although I knew I wouldn't have enough to finish, figured I'd put what I had out. Unfortunately, I discovered that I goofed on 2 of the packages and got white, instead of green cord. Hmmm. Take back to store? Nope, I was on a roll. It'll snow soon anyway. So I put up 4 strands and will get a few more this week. Closer to Thanksgiving I'll put up the outside Christmas extras-the present for the front porch, candy canes for the walkway to my back door, 2 little lit trees, and some lit poofy frond things I saw on sale and couldn't resist. Do you have your Christmas lights up?