Landscaping Lights Make A Difference



Throughout the years we've lived in our house, we have completed several projects in our yard. We live out in the country so there aren't any street lights to light our yard at night. We did install motion sensor lights at our backdoor but the front yard always appears to be quite dark, especially with no moon. One things we didn't want to do is leave the light on at the front door because it tends to attract those pesky bugs. We decided to have a look at landscaping lights to place along the sidewalk.

At the local home improvement center we quickly noticed that there is a huge variety of landscaping lights to choose from. Some of the landscaping lights were sold in complete sets and others were sold individually allowing for some mixing and matching. There also was a wide variety of solar powered lights for our landscape. We preferred this option because we would not have to hire an electrician to run cords and wires. We have three dogs that like to chase critters and we were concerned that they would get tangled in wires or electrical cords. The solar lights have a battery that is charged by direct sun light. The lights come on automatically at dusk and stay lit for much of the night. We liked the idea that the landscaping lighting would not cost additional money on our monthly electric bill.

We started out by purchasing eight solar lights that were shaped similar to small coach lights. They were made of copper and attached to stakes that we pushed into the ground. We placed them around the front of our home amongst the shrubs we had planted. In placing them you need to be sure that the cell that gathers the solar light has good exposure to the sun. We had also purchased two larger solar lights that hang on shepherd hooks. We placed one of these at the beginning of the front walk way and one by the back walkway. These were great for safety.

The landscaping lights are quite convenient. They turn on and off automatically and not only provide additional safety, but add beauty to the yard as well. The lights that are lower to the ground around the bushes do not seem to attract bugs. The lights that are placed on the shepherd hooks are far enough away from the house that the bugs they do attract don't cause an issue when opening the doors. We like the landscaping lights so much that we are going to add a couple spot lights to the backyard ornamental trees as well. The spot lights are positioned approximately a foot from the base of the tree and angled to shine up it. This will add another effect that our visitors are not used to seeing.