Moss Oak Avenue home lights up Citrus Heights with creative Christmas displays

By Sara Beth Williams–
The Simpson family’s home on Moss Oak Avenue in Citrus Heights has won awards for the elaborate Christmas lights and outdoor holiday decorations over the years, but the family says it’s not about competition.

The home at 8246 Moss Oak Ave. features a myriad of crisscrossed bright strings of lights that illuminate the sky at night. Underneath the lights are various Christmas displays with different themes, including a Christmas tree farm, a landing strip with Rudolph in an inflatable airplane, go-carts, a Surfing Santa display, a Santa’s Workshop, and a hot cocoa bar.

“We’re not in competition with anybody at all from anywhere. We do it for the kids and the families that drive down,” Terry Simpson said, adding that an elderly neighbor loved the lights so much they began decorating earlier in the year for him. Simpson said the family begins Nov. 1 and takes their time putting up decorations, starting with the lights.

Every year the family likes to add new and unique displays and will often build or remodel pieces by hand. The family will buy new inflatables but also likes to find and use recycled pieces from neighbors, garage sales, Facebook Marketplace, thrift stores, and ReStore, a business that supports Habitat for Humanity in Placer County.

Lisa Simpson said the items are “made with love, not perfection,” and that her boys, Ryan and Jake, often help by finding and helping build and paint display pieces, like the waves that make up the ocean in the Surfing Santa display.

The family also decorates the front yard for Halloween and repurposes the décor for the Christmas season. For Halloween, the family had a dance floor, which they repurposed and turned into Santa’s Workshop. Simpson said the hot cocoa bar, which features real mugs hanging off a custom-built wooden bar with Christmas characters seated on bar stools, was a new design this year that was first utilized during Halloween as a skeleton bar.

The Moss Oak Avenue home recently won the “Sleigh the Theme” category for the city’s annual Best Lights in Citrus Heights contest for 2024. The category highlights homes that have displays telling a cohesive story or that have a clear theme.

Along with recognition from the city’s annual contest, the home has been featured on Good Day Sacramento. Simpson said following an interview with Jordan Segundo during Halloween in 2023, the family decided to build a Surfing Santa display in honor of the anchor, who loves surfing. Segundo returned to interview the family for Christmas the same year.

In 2023, the home also won in the Hollywood Holidays category, which looks for homes that made the best use of popular Christmas characters. The home at 8246 Moss Oak Ave. was the only repeat winner in 2024.

2024: Check out these Christmas light displays in Citrus Heights