The Benefits of Timers.

Timers are a great way to control your holiday home lighting. By setting up times for your lights to burn you'll use less energy and cut back on those high electricity bills and extend the life of your Christmas Light sets. Timers range in style from the simple analog to programmable digital models. The number of outlets also will vary between models, from one to six.

Timers let you set your light displays up to only turn on when the sun is going down. Simply set the time when you want your sets to come on and when you want them to turn off. Let's say you want your sets to come on at 8 o'clock am and off at 2 o'clock pm just set the "ON" setting to 8pm and the "OFF" setting to 2 am. With our analog style timers you can do this for a couple times a day. Our digital timers however allow you to do multiple timed events for individual days. Our heavy duty digital timer have 14 on and off settings per day, so that's a total of 98 settings per week, that's a lot of control. They are easy to use and program and normally retail for under 40 dollars.

These are a easy and relatively inexpensive way to keep on top of controlling the burn time of your lights. Unless you want to plug them up and control them yourself throughout the day, invest in a timer and take the hassle out of plugging all your lights up at night!

Click here to see our timer section!

Chasing Lighting Controllers.

Since we started our site we've always tried to give customers the most affordable ways to control their lights at an affordable price. We work with one of the best lighting controller manufacturer in the country to bring reliable and functional Christmas light controllers to everyone.

Our Chasing controllers come in a variety of options. We have a preset controllers (shown on the left), on these controllers you simply plug your lights in and set a chase speed. These controllers come in 2, 3, and 4 circuit options with either a metal or plastic enclosure. To operate these sets you plug in your lights, power up the box, and use the small speed dial to set the speed at which you want your outlets. We've handled these for years and I can't think of a single instance of one of these being faulty from the factory, they are a quality Made in the USA controller that will last year after year.




We also have a programmable controller that allows you to create your own chasing pattern. These controllers are typically larger and more expensive but you can create much more elaborate chasing sequences. These controllers are used to animated larger displays, lets say you want to make a snow ball fight for two light displays, these controllers will do just that. They work by either changing some wire jumpers or setting positions on Dip switches. By adjusting these connections you can get the lighting show perfect for your Christmas or any display. These controller have the ability to power 3 to 10 different outlets and the higher number of outlets the more options you have for different lighting effects. These controllers are also Made in the USA.

New Specialty lighting products

We've got a new handful of new specialty products coming and in stock. We got a selection of what is called Kringle Garland, Its a globe covered mini light garland set. It looks great for adding into greenery such as pine garland or wreaths. The sets are in two different cluster types, one with 3 globes, and one with two globes and one twinkle bulb. The twinkle bulbs are random and really look great and add some motion to a static piece. The globes have a iridescent look to them which adds to the look of these sets.

We have these sets in clear bulbs on green wire and multi color bulbs on green wire are coming soon.

We are also getting some new Micro and Ultra Thin LED sets. Micro LED sets have a very small LED bulb in a socket and feature 60 bulbs a set, our sets will be warm white on white wire. These sets are great for adding small points of light while decorating, such as parties or weddings.



Ultra Thin LED sets are a battery powered sets that have no large sockets but a small LED bulb thats part of the wire itself. This thin design lets you put light in areas where you wouldn't normally be able too. These sets run off 3 AA batteries, have 18 bulbs a set, they have a 18 inch lead and 4 inch bulb space. These sets are coming soon.

We're going to be blogging a lot more since I'm out of school for the summer. We've got some changes to make and improve our site. Stay Tuned.






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Zach

Decorating with Curtain lights

As trends go, the use of curtain lights for Non-Christmas events has risen steadily over the past 3 years. The biggest use of these Curtain sets has for this non holiday use has been for Weddings and other Special Events. The most common way people use these for weddings is by hanging them on a wall or on a frame of some sort. Keep in mind that the weight of normal curtain lights (which are constructed like icicle mini lights) and Commercial curtain lights GREATLY vary in terms of weight.

Hanging Curtain Lights from your wall is, fairly, simple. If you have a drop ceiling then you can easily use a light weight wire or string and hang them from the ceiling grid. If you have walls you can drill or hammer nails into then you can very easily put some nails or hooks up. The biggest issue people run into is not being able to drill into a wall, or having concrete walls that have no drop ceiling you have a couple options. If you can hide it there is always heavy duty tape, duct tape of some sort comes in a variety of colors and even clear duct tape is now available. Some people have said they have used items like 3M's Command Line of adhesive hooks and hangers to hang these sets, you just have to make sure with any type of product that you can distribute the weight evenly. Nothing is worse than hanging your sets only to have not hung them properly and they come tumbling down in one section or the whole set.

Hanging them from some sort of frame is and easier option, so long as the frame itself can handle the weight. The frame or stand could be anything from just a couple pieces of PVC pipe made into a stand or frame of wood or metal. After you construct your frame/stand you can easily mount your sets, depending on it's constructing you can screw clips, mount nails, tape, zip tie, the list goes on and on. This can also allow you to hang some sort of fabric in front of your lights. This is a great way to set the mood and soften up the lights. Like in the picture below.


I hope this give you a little insight into hanging curtain lights. Please visit our curtain light section and wedding section for more wedding decorating ideas!

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Zach
All American Christmas Co.
www.aachristmas.com
www.allamericanchristmas.com

New LED sets for crafts!

So I've rambled and ranted about why LED bulbs and light sets are a better investment and so on, but every once in a while a new product shows up on the horizon and we get really excited in our office. We got a call from one of our suppliers/manufacturers about a new set designed for those people who need a LED for smaller scale and craft projects. After some negotiation with the factory and deliberation in our office we came up with a set that's going to be, dare I say, perfect for the niche it needs to fill.

Coming very soon is a LED light set that will have approx 20-25 Bulbs, 3-4 Inch Spacing, and no end connector and a extra long lead wire!!

...chances are you aren't as excited as we are, though, you should be if you are a fan of making crafts with Christmas lights. Imagine how you're Glass Blocks and Wine Bottles will look with these sets. They will generate no heat use very little power! The extra footage for the power chord means less extension chords, and the long life and reliability of these sets means less issues with customers. I could go on!

Stay tuned to the blog and I'll be sure to post when these great sets will be in for sale.

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Zach