[Times photo: John Pendygraft]
Vincent Naselli starts putting up his decorations in August and keeps them up for most of January. "Each year I kept adding on and adding on," says Naselli, 64, who began collecting lights in 1970.

By TAMARA LUSH, Times Staff Writer
© St. Petersburg Times
published December 25, 2001

TAMPA -- It all started in 1970, with two strands of white lights.

Vincent Naselli bought them at the Kmart on Columbus and Dale Mabry. He paid $1.19 for each. He strung them through the trees in front of his home on N Glen Avenue.

The next year, he bought a few more strands. Same thing in 1972.

"Each year I kept adding on and adding on," Naselli said. "As I went along, I added, let me see, what did I add .. .?"

The question, is, what didn't he add?

He has about 200,000 lights, a Santa Claus, citronella torches, colored lights, white icicles, blue icicles, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, two wise men, angels, sheets set on the ground to look like snow, candles, deer and a baby Jesus statue nestled in some hay.

"That statue is 41 years old," Naselli says. "I just touched him up a little."

Naselli, who is 64, has so many Christmas decorations that he starts putting them up in August and keeps them up until the end of January. So many decorations that 48 hours before Christmas, he hadn't quite finished putting all of them up.

So many decorations, that in 1991, he built a shed in his back yard to store everything.

"I could make an apartment out of it, that's how big it is," he said.

This year, Naselli added a a device that he has stretched across the street, a cable that counts the number of cars that pass by his house. "So far tonight," he said on Saturday, "about 560."

Vehicles drive by the house from dusk until 1 or 2 a.m., which is when he shuts the lights off. On Christmas Eve, he keeps the lights and the Christmas music on all night. The music comes from records, which are played on a turntable.

Many on N Glen Avenue have followed Naselli's lead and decorated their homes with strands of lights and statues. But no one's yard quite tops Naselli's.

Each year, Naselli picks a decorating theme. Last year's was "The Prince of Peace." The year before that was "Winter Wonderland."

This year, the entire yard is dedicated to baby Jesus and the people who died in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, the airliner that went down in Pennsylvania and their families. He fashioned an American flag out of red, white and blue lights, and on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, he will hold a candlelight vigil at 8 p.m. in his yard. The public is invited, and donations will be collected and sent to a 9/11 charity. Naselli, who moved to Florida from New York in 1959, will serve cookies and cocoa.

Until then, Naselli will focus on Christmas. Santa made an appearance Sunday and Monday, and will show up in Naselli's yard again, from 7 to 9 tonight. Naselli has Christmas decorations inside his house as well. He's planning his Christmas menu, because about a dozen friends are expected for dinner. He also needs to attach bows and bells onto his two tiny dogs, Mima and Dolly, and his four cats, Callie, Mika, Heidi and Whiskers.

As of Saturday night, he hadn't yet trimmed his own Christmas tree.

He doesn't care that his electric bill rises $20 each holiday season.

"It's baby Jesus' birthday," said Naselli, who is single. "He gets a beautiful birthday. I don't care how much it costs."

But he doesn't need to spend any money to have a merry Christmas.

"Every Christmas is the best Christmas."

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