Welcome to the landing page for the Denmeads’ holiday lights on Sutton Loop in Fremont, CA. More than 20 years ago (and in another house), Robin asked Ken to put some lights up, and he said they should just have some white lights on the eaves and leave it at that. But once they found some cool inflatables, and a few other odds and ends, the seed for an obsession was born.
Fast forward to 2021, and we’ve been doing some form of holiday display here on Sutton Loop for over 15 years, and figured it was about time to give it a place on the web for display. If you’ve arrived here, there’s a good change you followed the QR code out front of our house; if so – welcome neighbor!
We like to start the holiday season in October with Indigenous Peoples Day and try to have some serious decorations and lights up in time for Halloween. Lights often go up in our neighborhood for Divali as early as mid-October, and stay up all the way through New Years, which we’re more than happy to support and celebrate!
This year, as we come out of the pandemic, it feels like people really need to celebrate and we’ve noticed holiday decorations going up just a bit earlier all over. We’re trying to put forth our best display yet with our painted Disney characters and our light show with over an hour of songs and movie/TV clips to entertain you. Robin hand-paints all the character boards, and Ken uses the Light-o-Rama hardware and software system for the light show. We have new boards this year with characters who have been very important to us, and we’re trying some new things in the light show with two sets of arches, including one over the sidewalk, that we hope people will enjoy. Some of the light sequences were purchased and then applied to our layout, some came from other enthusiasts online and adapted, and some we crafted ourselves. We’ve picked songs that tickle our fancy, either out of nostalgia, or because they’ve delighted us over the years. There are a couple Disney songs here that aren’t strictly holiday songs, but we love them for their positive spirit. Overall, we hope they bring you joy.
We also have a favor to ask: if you’ve walked past our house over the years, you’re probably familiar with our dogs, who will often sit in the bay window and sometimes send you their excited greetings as you pass by. This year, we lost our oldest pooch, Short Round (the grey, fluffy spaniel/poodle mix) suddenly to an aggressive cancer. If you enjoy our holiday shows and would like to give a little something back, we ask that you consider making a donation to the Tri-City Animal Shelter in Short Round Denmead’s name, which is where we adopted him many years ago.
As for the song/clip list for this year, here’s the set:
Holidays 2021 Full Program (1:18:51):
2021 Christmas Vacation – Lotta Lights Dad Clip (0:31)
2021 Mavis Staples – Christmas Vacation Theme (3:00)
2021 Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1:55)
2021 Griswold Style Mix (4:22)
2021 Catwoman in Gold Lame Clip (0:31)
2021 Santa Baby – Earta Kitt (3:28)
2021 Star Wars the Mandalorian Clip (0:23)
2021 Carol of the Mandalorian (2:36)
2021 Love Actually – All I Want for Christmas (3:05)
2021 Die Hard – The Vault Opens Clip (1:11)
2021 Christmas in Hollis – Run DMC (2:58)
2021 Charlie Brown Christmas Tree Clip (0:21)
2021 Christmas Time is Here (2:47)
2021 Snow – White Christmas (2:06)
2021 Christmas in Sarajevo (3:26)
2021 Donna and Blitzen (4:20)
2021 Scrooged – A Christmas Miracle Clip (1:54)
2021 Put a Little Love in Your Heart (3:49)
2021 Tom Lehrer – A Christmas Carol Intro Clip (0:41)
2021 A Christmas Carol (1:43)
2021 Late Show Darlene Intro Clip (0:18)
2021 Christmas Baby Please Come Home (2:47)
2021 Is That You Santa Claus (2:50)
2021 MASH – Charles and Klinger Christmas Clip (1:06)
2021 Last Christmas (4:25)
2021 Elf – He’s an Angry Elf Clip (1:44)
2021 O Holy Night (4:24)
2021 White Christmas from Holiday Inn Intro Clip (0:27)
2021 White Christmas – Kaskade Remix (3:36)
2021 Let’s Go Fly a Kite (1:54)
2021 SOM My Favorite Things Clip (0:18)
2021 My Favorite Things (3:03)
2021 Ted Lasso Higgins Christmas Speech CLip (1:02)
2021 Ted Lasso Theme (2:16)
2021 Happy XMas (War is Over) (3:34)
Happy Holidays to you and yours!
~Ken Denmead & Robin Musetti-Denmead
Our lights in 2009.
