HOLIDAY DECORATIONS 'Christmas crazy' prepares for holiday long before December

The holiday display, totaling 'at least' $25,000, is for the memories.
POLAND -- For those who lament that Christmas seems to start earlier every year, consider Tony Porrazzo.
For this Poland Township father of two, the holiday season begins in July, more than three months before decorations and carols start popping up in stores and on street corners.
That's when Porrazzo starts his search for the latest and greatest in Yuletide decorations -- 8-foot inflatable Shrek and SpongeBob, larger-than-life Santas, sleighs and snowmen, a chorus line of lighted carolers.
Porrazzo's frenzy of eBay wheeling and dealing results in a two-car garage packed to the rafters with boxes of yard decorations. When the rest of the world is munching miniature candy bars at Halloween, Porrazzo is putting the finishing touches on the front-yard Christmas display he calls Porrazzo Land. When the calendar page flips to November, the lights go on -- and they don't go off until Dec. 26.
So just how big is this display?
"I've got $25,000 in my front yard," Porrazzo said. "At least."
A family affair
Porrazzo, 34, describes himself as a "Christmas crazy." His wife, Paula; his two children, Anthony, 10, and Katrina, 8; and nephew, EB, 16, agree with his assessment, but they're willing participants in what has become a family focus each fall.
The children take days off from school and the entire family works from 7 a.m. to midnight for a solid week, creating a Christmas display that delivers a steady stream of gawkers for 56 days.
The family starts inside the house with lighted trees, tinsel, music, plush figures and twinkling lights. Even in the kitchen, placemats and canisters are part of the holiday d & eacute;cor. But the real focal point inside is the expansive Christmas village -- some 50 feet of green-topped tables crowded with tiny lighted buildings and figurines, skating rinks and ponds.
Then they move outside, tethering giant inflatable characters, testing lights, then laying out the lines, connecting cord after cord.
Windy weather makes it tough; on a recent night, powerful gusts were causing one of Porrazzo's largest displays -- a Santa sleigh and reindeer that cost $1,000 -- to flop around like a rag doll.
Christmas memories
It's truly a labor of love for Porrazzo, who grew up on Youngstown's East Side. He has vivid memories of family Christmases from his childhood; the Porrazzos started with a traditional Italian Christmas Eve that turned the holiday into a two-day celebration. It's those happy memories that Porrazzo wants to pass down to his children, and possibly their children, years from now. It's more important to him than ever, since his father, uncles and beloved godfather are gone.
"What do I always say to you when we're setting all this up?" Porrazzo asks young Anthony. "I'll stop in the middle of it all, and I'll say to him, 'Remember this. Remember this.' And that's why I'm doing it -- so they'll have the memory."
Letters to Santa
What started as a family tradition has expanded to touch other lives as well, Porrazzo said. His favorite part of the yard display is an oversized mailbox that he checks several times a day. It almost always contains a letter or two addressed to "Santa" in a childlike scrawl, and Porrazzo answers each one.
Occasionally, other letters are left in the box. The family treasures a note they received last year from a man who told them that he'd been going through a rough time in his life and one of the bright spots he came to count on was driving by the Porrazzo's display every day.
"That meant so much to us," Paula Porrazzo said.
The letters are encouraging, but what really keeps Porrazzo going is seeing the excited faces and hearing the delighted squeals from children who tumble out of the family car to walk among the giant inflatable characters. His family passes out candy canes to visitors who stop by. On weekends, he often counts more than 150 cars a day.
Those characters make his display stand out, he said. He may branch out into more animated characters next year, Porrazzo said, but he'll keep the light displays to a minimum. "Lights, to me, are boring," he said.
He's never had a problem with vandalism; instead, he's actually had decorations tossed into his yard. He doesn't worry about theft.
"If somebody does (steal something), then God bless 'em," Porrazzo said. "They need it more than we do."
'It just exploded'
When the Porrazzos moved into their home in 1996, their holiday decorations were "normal," Paula Porrazzo said -- a tree, lights, a wreath on the door. Each year, her husband kept adding to the mix, and in 2000, "it just exploded."
Tony Porrazzo laughs. "It got progressively worse," he said.
He monitors Web sites such as www.planetchristmas.com to check out what others are doing, but he said he's not trying to outdo anyone. "I'm really not in it for the ego," he said. "I'm not looking to compete. I just want people to remember."
The Porrazzo family will celebrate Christmas Day, take a day to rest and then the display comes down. It takes just a day to pack it all up; everything fits neatly into bags and boxes, and it's all stored in the garage -- until next October.
And Porrazzo moves through the days, just waiting for his favorite season to roll back around.
"You know, every January through October, it's just going through the grind, going through the motions, just living. I'm in fifth gear all year.
"Then November rolls around, and work and everything is just secondary. My priority is family. That's all I care about. Just family and the memories."