The weeks of darkness that lead up to Christmas are also known as the season of lights. I try to play along, but I am annually frustrated by my attempts to keep all my strings of lights lit up.

(not in my happy place)

Now, it's been said of me that I am "not the brightest bulb in the string", and that's probably so.

(not to be trusted)

So begins my quest to get the lights on my Christmas to light up. I went shopping for replacement bulbs, and my old incandescent lights are being replaced with LED lights, so I even had to work extra hard just to find the right bulbs. Hopefully, I'll figure it out and be happy once again.

(yeah, still not to be trusted)

Now, for a photographer, light is everything, so the holidays should be a natural time for photo taking. Tree lights are a great chance to apply effects like using  a star filter to enhance the sparkle. Here's an example of a photo without and with a star filter effect.

(no star)   (with star filter)

By the way, those are Janet's handpainted ornaments... aren't they great?

Wish me luck on my quest to get all my lights shining again!