River Park Christmas Light Installation

There are exactly two ways into River Park, both off H Street, and every neighbor you have drives past your house on the way to one of them. That’s a lot of friendly eyes on your eaves come December. If you’d like yours looking sharp without a Saturday on the roof, River Park Christmas light installation is our whole job. The lights ride in with us, go up on our ladders, click on by timer, and leave with us again in January. Call (916) 313-4551 and tell us about your place.

Most of River Park went up between 1947 and the 1960s, and the look is California ranch: one story, long and low, with an eave that runs a good way across the lot. One long straight run across the front looks clean from the street, and because the roof is low, the glow sits close to eye level where people on the sidewalk notice it.

Roofline lights ride on little plastic clips that pinch your gutter or a shingle tab. We don’t use nails or staples, so your fascia ends the season hole-free. On a ranch we usually suggest the front eave plus whatever low gable sits above the garage or the entry, and then we stop. A ranch outlined on all four sides is more outline than house.

River Park front yards sit under mature elms and maples, with lawns edged in shrubs and wide sidewalks lined with the neighborhood’s mint-green lampposts. A big elm or maple trunk is a fine candidate for a tree wrap. We wind the trunk snug and carry the lights up into the first main branches, which lends a low house some height. One caution: the lampposts already put a soft glow on the street, so you don’t have to overdo it to be seen. A wrapped trunk and a tidy roofline usually beat a yard with one of everything.

Shrub-edged lawns are made for stake lighting. We set the stakes along the walk or the lawn edge and keep them clear of sprinkler heads, so nobody discovers a geyser on watering day. If your shrubs run across the front of the house, ask about those too. We have a whole page on lighting shrubs and hedges.

Plenty of ranch homes have a couple of slim posts holding up the porch overhang. A pillar wrap suits those, wound evenly from the base up to the beam. Add a lit wreath to the door or above the garage, then loop lit garland over the doorway or down a porch rail, and the whole front looks finished when seen from the curb on Carlson Drive, Sandburg Drive, Moddison Avenue or wherever you happen to live.

Everything runs to a timer. You pick when it comes on and when it goes dark, and it minds itself after that. If a strand quits mid-season, phone (916) 313-4551 and we’ll get it glowing again.

River Park doesn’t have a homeowners association. Neighbors join the River Park Neighborhood Association by choice, so there’s no approved calendar and no committee reviewing your wreath. Light up as early as you please, in any colors you please. The neighborhood already has a reputation for holiday lights, so you’ll be in good company.

Since nobody sets a schedule for you, calling early simply means more install days to choose between. Takedown happens in January. We pull every clip and every strand, and you never stack a single bin in the garage.

Quotes happen by phone, at (916) 313-4551, or off pictures you text, email or send through our contact page. Cross the street, squeeze your entire house front into one shot, and snap one more of any tree or porch you want lit. If you’re on a block near Glenn Hall Park or Caleb Greenwood Elementary, where families walk past every evening, say so. Same goes if your back fence looks toward the American River and Paradise Beach and you only want lights facing the street.

We’re a downtown crew, and River Park fits in with our East Sacramento light installs on the other side of the tracks, College Greens just upriver and the rest of our Sacramento holiday lighting routes. If “turn at the Scottish Rite Masonic Center” is how you give directions, we already know the way.

Does anyone in River Park set the dates for Christmas lights?

No. There’s no HOA, and joining the River Park Neighborhood Association is optional, so there is no set display period. You choose the start, and we take them down in January.

Will the clips hurt the gutters or shingles on my ranch house?

They shouldn’t. Every clip we use is a squeeze-on plastic one that lets go cleanly in January. Nail guns and staplers never come near a River Park eave.

Can you wrap the big elm in my front yard?

Most likely. Trunk first, then the low main branches, is our normal approach. Text us a photo that shows the whole tree and the nearest outdoor outlet so we can plan the power.

I’m near Glenn Hall Park. What gets noticed on a walking block?

Low things. Families pass on foot every evening near Glenn Hall Park and Caleb Greenwood Elementary, so a wrapped trunk, the porch posts and the front path count for more than a second roofline.