Lights, action, Christmas!

On U.S. 17, along the Jacksonville-Maysville border, you can’t miss them.

Two neighboring farmhouses take advantage of spacious front yards to create brightly lit extravaganzas of holiday spirit. With shedsful of decorations consuming every square inch of the lawns, it seems to the casual passerby that the two houses are in yearly competition for most vibrant display.

But according to 75-year-old Pauline Humphrey, who unpacked three sheds’ worth of decorations recently with her husband, Leonard, 82, it’s just a friendly tradition that runs in the family. Three neighboring houses along U.S.17 near Piney Green Road belong to Humphrey family members.

“We’re just decorating for the kids, and they do love it,” Pauline said.

Leonard Humphrey’s sister-in-law, Juanita Humphrey, began the decorating tradition with her late husband, David. All these years later, there’s some confusion about when the decorating began in force. Juanita, 79, said she has been putting out lawn ornaments for more than 35 years, while her in-laws across the way have only been decorating for the last six or seven. Pauline believes they have both been lighting up the highway together for the last 12 or 15 years.

Although Pauline and Leonard have not been part of the decorating tradition for as long, their stock of Christmas decorations is quickly becoming formidable, and Pauline said careful thought goes into scheme and arrangement.

“I wait to see what (Juanita has) got because I don’t want to put out the same thing,” she said. “I want mine to be different. It seems more exciting.”

For example, she said, since she noticed a figurine of praying hands in the yard next door, she wouldn’t be putting hers out this year.

And the great quantity of items does not mean that she pays any less attention to detail, she said.

If her husband sets up the items out of order, Pauline said she tells him, “‘Leonard, I hate to tell you, you’ve done a good job, but it weren’t the way I want it.’”

The Christmas scenes began small, Shelia Humphrey, Juanita’s daughter said.

“Mama started with the manger scene and (a sign) ‘Merry Christmas, The Humphreys,’” Shelia said. “It just began to grow.”

Now her lawn is overrun with herds of wooden reindeer, lights and figurines of all varieties, many of them made by family members, as well as a tractor strung with lights and a moving Santa beside a chimney in a wooden shed at the center. The ornaments begin to go up on Thanksgiving Day, with the help of Juanita’s children and grandchildren.

And this year, the over-the-top celebration of Christmas will have special, additional meaning: Juanita’s granddaughter Racheal Humphrey, a 22-year-old diagnosed in 2008 with a malignant tumor in her liver, passed away on Oct. 30. The family put up a lit sign in the middle of the lawn reading “Racheal Believers” next to a fish in honor of David Humphrey.

“She’ll be missed,” Juanita said of Racheal. “She was such a beautiful girl.”

She faithfully puts up the display each year, Juanita said, because her husband enjoyed it so much, especially watching people take in the lights as they passed by.

“I just look forward like him to sitting and watching the people go by,” Juanita said.

Contact Hope Hodge at 910-219-8453 or hhodge@freedomenc.com.

Can’t get enough holiday lights?

Visit the Holiday Center where you can post a photo of your own holiday decorations along with the address to show off your hard work (or the work of your neighbors). The center also includes area holiday events, letters to Santa, holiday poems, Baby’s First Christmas photo contest, a Christmas trivia quiz and holiday memories. Check out what others have submitted, and submit your own.