Laura and Sargoon Yousif with their dog, Ollie, outside their festive home. Photo: RNZ / Alexander Robertson
Christmas may be over but the show and the glow still lingers for some, with a traffic-stopping, visual symphony of the festive season north of Wellington.
Drive around the streets and you might notice more and more houses covered in Christmas decorations and lights, with ever bolder and more creative displays.
One that falls into that category is in Discovery Drive in Whitby, north of Wellington.
Property owners Sargoon and Laura Yousif have created a traffic-stopping, visual symphony of the festive season.
They did it for the first time last year, and Sargoon says he's addicted.
"I have normal lights that you can buy from the shops, and I also have strip lights controlled by music, and all the effects. I've got a Christmas tree that does 10,000 different colour effects."
Sargoon starts putting it all up at the beginning of November, ready for the start of December.
It's something of an electrical engineering feat.
"I use three different mother boards so I won't blow a fuse and then at each location is about 30 transformers. I also make them waterproof so that no one gets electrocuted and they all run on timers."
Laura and Sargoon Yousif with their dog, Ollie, outside their festive home. Photo: RNZ / Alexander Robertson
He estimates he's spent about "a couple of grand" just for this year alone and in terms of power, all the lights add about another $4-5 a day for the 30 days he has the display up.
Because of the Wellington wind he also uses about 3000 cable ties to keep everything tied down.
Wife Laura is a big supporter.
"It's my husband's hobby and he's built on it and made a lot of the displays himself. I'm there holding the ladder when he's going up on top of the roof to do the lighting, so yeah I'm fully supportive."
The couple say their neighbours love it and a lot of people drive by and pop out to admire what they've done and have a chat. In fact Sargoon says his neighbours want to hold a big New Year's party at his place before he takes the display down.
Sargoon is already thinking ahead to next year when he says the display will be even bigger and brighter.
"I've got six computerised mother boards coming. I also have 153,000 LEDs and I have ordered 250,000 more."
"I also got a snow machine coming out, but she took my credit card off me this year. She said no more spending."
Even the couple's dog Ollie can't escape the Christmas spirit - he has a special LED light collar so he fits right in.
