Christmas in Kamloops: How to one-up your overachieving neighbours

KAMLOOPS – What do you do when your neighbours could challenge Clark Griswold in a Christmas lights contest and you don’t have the time or inclination to plan ahead for something that big?

You do the only thing possible — embrace it and ‘ditto’ it.

The Fords moved in next to Grant and Jacki Andersen on Ida Lane in Westsyde three Christmases ago. Before they even bought they were warned about the holiday spirit next door.

“People would say ‘you know the neighbours, right? They really decorate at Christmas’,” mom Jacquie Ford laughs, adding they didn’t think much of it until the first year.

“They took pity on us that first year, they brought over a bunch of blow ups (to put up in our yard),” dad Todd says, describing the Andersen Christmas display as "intimidating."

The following year they did nothing, other than a small light up candy cane in the yard.

“We were dark, there was nothing,” daughters Charlotte, 11, and Isabella, 14, laugh.

This year new neighbours Gordon and Marilyn moved in on the north side of the Fords and they have shown a lot of holiday spirit already as well.

Now surrounded in Christmas displays, the Fords wanted to do something this year. They thought about having a large Grinch pulling down lights but then decided to take an even ‘easier’ route, and the ‘DITTO’ sign was born.

They covered large cardboard letters in duct tape and aluminum tape and added them to the deck with four strings of lights along with arrows pointing to the neighbours on both sides of their house.

They ran into more complications getting everything set up than they expected, but within a week of being set up the lights garnered a lot of attention on social media and in the neighbourhood. Todd says random cars have even been coming onto their driveway to get a better look.

While they are having fun with their display this year, they are thinking ahead to next year, though Jacquie says they probably won’t plan ahead enough to do anything big.

“We thought about adding a tangled ball of lights hanging down,” Charlotte laughs.

To contact a reporter for this story, email Jennifer Stahn at jstahn@infonews.ca or call 250-819-3723. To contact an editor, email mjones@infonews.ca or call 250-718-2724.