by Jeremy Couso
SusanvilleStuff Publisher and Editor
Good morning, friends and neighbors! We made it to Friday! Here we are, headed straight into the two final icy-cold weeks of 2022 and boy, it feels like winter in Susanville.
Snowy remnants of last week’s storms are now rock-solid obstacles, frozen into permanence by nightly temperatures that reach down into single digits, and daytime highs barely reaching freezing. Cold, I tell you. Brrr
My Most Favorite Project of the Year
Here at SusanvilleStuff our December is packed with so much stuff that we basically start sprinting around Thanksgiving and drag ourselves over the finish line in time for Christmas. It has been that way for the 20 years we have owned SusanvilleStuff and it’s become our holiday tradition to just sort of exhaust ourselves. I end up with a whole string of big projects that all conclude about this time each year.
But then along comes the final project of each holiday season, and my absolute favorite, putting together our annual Video Light Gallery.
This is something Marshel and I have been doing now for sixteen years – traveling around the valley taking pictures of the neat light displays and putting together a big year end gallery.
It is amazing how technology has changed. In the beginning we used to take still pictures of the light displays, now we shoot 4K video.
Usually, it takes us three or four full nights of shooting to get the 150 to 175 video clips we need.
We go stand in the dark in people’s yards in the cold and howling wind and it is usually miserable and we don’t care, because it’s a fun tradition. And the end result is worth it.
This has been a Couso family tradition long enough that we have taken both our kids, and then our grandkids, out with us on our video-gathering expeditions. Christmas carols playing way too loud… searching up and down and all around for the most Christmassy displays to film.
I mention all of this because Mrs. Couso and I will be out taking video for this year’s gallery over the next few nights, so if you have submitted your displays make sure you have them on. Of course, we stop and take video of any really neat displays we see, so if you have something cool make sure the lights are on this weekend for us to drive by and video.
Here is a tip from our video guy – if your holiday twinkly lights are on the front of the house turn your porch light off. The bright porch light makes it impossible to get video of the dimmer lights.
Also, (and this is something we have noticed over the years, and we aren’t sure if it is just a ‘Susanville thing’) for some reason this time of year people like to leave their garage door open and the light on in the evening. This makes it hard to get nice video of your house and holiday light displays.
It’s a Winter Wonderland at the Fairgrounds
I just love the annual Festival of Lights at the Fairgrounds and this year there are some added attractions to behold as part of the twinkly high-wattage fun.
New, bigger displays line the drive through portion of the fairgrounds, refreshments are now being sold at the fairgrounds’ entrance and in the floral building there is the most amazing display of Christmas, put together by the nice folks at Lassen County Grown.
For those of you unfamiliar with the group, their mission is to promote the production and marketing of Lassen Grown Products, encouraging growth in, ‘entrepreneurial opportunities to better serve the community of Lassen County with helping drive out of area visitors to our lovely Lassen County through Agri-Tourism.’
The building-sized tribute to the Christmas spirit features nearly every iteration of the holiday, from Christ’s birth in a lovely nativity, scenes from that famous Dickens novel, a ride on the Polar Express, electric trains, snowmen and more.
A lot of time and work went into this display, and it is worth taking some time to stop by the fairgrounds to see the Holiday Festival of Lights and the Lassen Grown Christmas display. Click here to head over to the Fair’s website for a complete Festival of Lights schedule.
A Pretty Little Church Full of Beautiful Music
In the early years of the Susanville Symphony I can vividly remember going to the Christmas concerts at the Methodist Church, and it was simply perfect. The much-vaunted acoustics, the unique architecture, and its cozy little uptown location lent itself well to the annual Christmas performance. Plus, it is a block from our house.
I was disappointed when they moved the concerts out the Assembly of God Church, and I totally understood the move gave them much needed room, but still, the old church at Christmas was the best.
And now, this year, the Christmas concerts return to the Methodist Church! Just like the old days. Tickets are a little harder to get because there are fewer to go around but grab yourself one early this morning if you want to go because they normally sell out.
Artistic Conductor and baton waver Ben Wade promises a spectacular show full of all of the wonderful things we have grown to expect from the annual Christmas show. That sounds good to me! Wade is just as excited as everybody else about the return to the Methodist Church, saying it feels like coming home for Christmas.
Hey, go put up some Christmas lights so when we come around to your house tonight, we can take video.
Have a great weekend everybody! When we meet again Christmas will be near!
