Longtime Murrieta Holiday Light Display Transplants to Kentucky

A longtime holiday tradition for Murrieta residents will now become one for residents more than 2,000 miles away in La Grange, Ky.

Mike and Yvonne Glover for more than 13 years. It became known to locals quickly, and the Glover's extravagant, synchronized light show made it to an HGTV holiday homes special one year.

Residents who stopped by were treated to candy canes--Mike said toward the end they were going through 35,000 to 40,000 candy canes a season--as well as hot chocolate. Fake snow from a blower entertained Murrieta's youngest residents, and passing motorists tuned to an AM radio station to follow along with the synchronized display that offered patriotic and seasonal renditions.

But the couple, who reached 65 last year and decided to retire--Mike from his job as nighttime maintenance supervisor at Pechanga Resort and Casino and Yvonne from her job as an administrative assistant at Pomona First Baptist Church--did something they'd been wanting to do for a long time: they are renting a 7.5-acre piece of property in Kentucky, where Mike's family is originally from.

"We just started looking and this place came up," Yvonne said by phone Wednesday. "We prayed about it and this is where we wanted to be."

Mike said they didn't feel they could afford to live in California on their retirement incomes.

"We could have survived, but it wasn't something we wanted to do...it was a hard decision to move out here."

Their Murrieta home is still on the market after two buyers fell through, Yvonne said.

They intended to continue the tradition at their new home, but Yvonne said with a narrow driveway leading up to the house, they feared they wouldn't get much traffic.

Instead, Mike's synchronized display will light up La Grange's town square. The town, with a population of 8,200, has traditionally lit up its courthouse square each year. Now, Mike's display will bring it even more to life.

"Mike is lighting up La Grange," Yvonne said.

Faith Brush, assistant to the La Grange city clerk, said she lives across the street from the courthouse and can't wait to see it every night.

According to Brush, the new and improved "Light Up La Grange" will debut Friday night and run every night through Christmas.

"They are just the neatest people," Brush said of the Glovers.

It hasn't taken long for the news of the display to catch on. An article by a local newspaper shows photos of Mike setting up the display.

La Grange Mayor Bill Lammlein said he met Mike in a coffee shop. Mike showed him a YouTube video of his decorated house in Murrieta, and before long, the city and county agreed to allow Mike to bring the same to the courthouse plaza.

"I just feel like we are the luckiest people on earth," Lammlein said by phone. "This is like manna from heaven."

Lammlein said they aren't quite sure yet how they will foot the electric bill, but that the county and city will share the cost to light the 4-acre historic courthouse plaza. Mike has been working for 40 days to illuminate the plaza, which is flanked by three blocks of shops along Main Street, he said.

"We think this will be a real boon; like everyone else, we've suffered from the recession."

La Grange is 20 miles north of Kentucky's largest city, Louisville, and 60 miles from Cincinnati, Ohio, he said. As word travels about the display, he envisions a lift to the local economy.

Mike said it has been a challenge to orchestrate the new display, but the county and city have supplied help crews, such as inmates from the nearby county jail.

"We'll get it up, I am determined," Mike said.

There is one other major difference.

"We don't have to put down the fake snow here," he said.

And for those Murrieta and Temecula residents who will miss the Glover's display, a new display has come to town. Thirteen homes on Bainbridge Circle in Murrieta are synchronized to music.