On December 5th, 2020 the Light Up Conifer X-Mas light contest was started. People from all around Conifer participated in the competition to see who had the best lights. But around the start of January, the contest came to an end. 

“I really hope that there will be another year for others to participate in the light up contest,” Melanie Swearengin, of the Conifer Chamber of Commerce said, “It was very successful for it’s very first year, and everyone who participated did a great job, next year I would like to see what the others could do or if the others who participated become even better.”

Swearengin was one of the people who started up the contest for the people of Conifer to compete. During the contest Swearengin competed in the contest to see if she could be part of the big time lights. 

“I really didn’t do anything special for my house at all, just setting up little lights here and there. But sense people would drive on our road a lot. We put it up for others to enjoy and just look at Christmas lights,” Swearengin said.

With a contest always comes a prize. The Conifer Chamber of Commerce and local businesses pitched into the contest, offering prizes for the winners to enjoy for their hard work.

“Everything is not too special for the winners but every winner which is 1st to 3rd receives a plaque of their names and says 1st, 2nd or 3rd,” Swearengin said.

Third place winner, Cara Adams and her husband worked nicely to get to third place, even though she had doubts about her lights, others thought that they were meaningful towards the christmas spirit.

“Me and my husband like to start setting up our lights in early november, we both start thinking about what our plans are and then we start spending all of November working. We’re done during the start of Thanksgiving and we give them a bit of a test drive.” Adams said. 

Even though Christmas gives off a sense of beauty and demonstrates what someone can accomplish, there is a burden to having them outside on a cold night. 

“Some struggles we went through with having our lights was the wind, we were dealing with it all the time.” Adams said, “We had a great lit tree and one night it was blown over and some of the lights went out on it, and also another issue we had was lights going out because of how cold it got on some nights.”

When the contest was still in motion for the Adams family, they didn’t even know it was a contest. Cara was caught by surprise to see a 3rd place award sitting on their porch.

“We had friends drive past our house and told us we should give the Conifer Chamber of Commerce our address to see if people would come by. During this point we just thought it was simple fun.” Adams said, “But by the start of January me and my husband came home to see a third place award with goodies and a nice 3rd place plaque.”

When Cara’s lights were still up in December, some of her neighbors came to see her about the star they had put up on their barn to represent what Christmas was truly about.

“Everyone was so thankful and meaningful that we did that for the neighborhood to represent that Christmas is about love, family and most importantly jesus.” Adams said, “It just warms my heart that people will care about what you put up for christmas and what it could represent to everyone, christmas to me is all about who you spend it with and lights show what your passions can be.”