It’s always around this time of the year that I appreciate the design elements of our outdoor lighting scheme. The days are getting shorter and I find that I am turning on our outdoor lights slightly earlier each day. The result of decent outdoor lighting is that we can still use our outdoor space into late August and September.

During the longer days of mid summer, it seemed that I could cook and entertain relatively late without worrying about turning on the lights. Safety is a big issue for me, and I like having stairs and pathways of my back yard lit well enough so my friends and family don’t end up in a bush. But now that the days are shorter, I just enjoy turning on the lights so that my evening guests can enjoy the ambiance as much as I do.

We started to create our outdoor lighting scheme about 5 years ago. My spouse and I were charmed by the simplicity and beautiful effect of the outdoor lights of a French restaurant we visited in Mexico. Since that time we have experimented with many different types of outdoor lighting designs. Our scheme is a work in progress and it gets refined each year. Some years we use a lot of string lights while in other years we use spot lights and twinkly lights. We generally tend to stick to white lights although we sometimes use the odd colored spotlight.

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Have you ever thought about installing an outdoor spot light? It is easier than you thought and these lights serve more purposes than originally thought. Most homes or business establishments that have outdoor lighting schemes can benefit from the installation of outdoor spot lights. Outdoor spotlights have a number of different purposes ranging from providing extra security, high-lighting pathways, providing extra safety, and providing a nice form of ambiance. Properly positioned spot lights are a wonderful addition to any outdoor lighting scheme.

Typically when you think of outside spotlights you probably think of outdoor concerts, or outdoor shows where event planners needed to draw your attention to one specific spot (moving or stationary). Or perhaps you have only really seen spotlights lighting up the sign in front of local businesses. These are ideal uses for the spotlight, but you might not realize that there are many places around your own house that you could install a spotlight to great effect. Think of your backyard lighting scheme, do you have a wonderful statue or birdbath that could be lit up at night? Using outdoor spotlights let you focus attention on objects that would normally be lost in the dark, allowing you to create focal points that add extra dimension to your outdoor lighting scheme.

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Everyone seems to be in harmony these days when it comes to making your home environmentally friendly. Outdoor solar garden lighting lights up your garden in the most eco-friendly way.

Solar power is the answer to landscape lighting that is free and earth friendly. According to the U.S. Department of Energy, outdoor solar lights use solar cells to convert sunlight to electricity, storing that electricity in batteries during the day for use at night. The department adds that outdoor solar lighting systems and solar-powered products will only perform well if they receive the manufacturers recommended amount of daily sunlight. So as your garden lights stand in the garden throughout the day, they receive the power they need to shine for you at night.

Products that power themselves from natural sunlight are becoming more popular and are moving beyond the basic.

Dress up your patio with solar strings lights. This is a great entertaining idea as they come in fun shapes such as ladybugs, flowers and butterflies.

If you are looking for a way to illuminate your street address, the solar powered stone, lights up with your street number on it. The stone light is a natural finish that looks like a real stone.

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Just about anybody who’s had or has a yard or garden has wanted to brighten them up. One way to do so is by improving garden lighting with solar lights. If you do a good job of picking them out and installing them correctly, you’ll see an immediate improvement in style and appearance. In fact, the whole yard — including pathways – can benefit from the easy installation of solar lighting packages.

Old-way energy costs were a sticking point. It used to be that in the old days, expensive conduit piping added to costs. Trenches of from twelve to eighteen inches needed to be dug, and then weather-resistant and long-lasting wiring ran from the house to each of the garden lights in a sequence. Let’s not forget that all those power needs had to be met by an additional fuse or circuit within the house. This required even more energy and added to the monthly electric bill. With solar lighting, though, that’s no longer a problem.

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If you are looking to build the garden of your dreams, you should know about solar garden lighting and solar lights. A garden, naturally, thrives beneath the light, love, and nourishment of the sun. however, what happens when the sun goes down? Well, with solar garden lights, your garden can be just as illuminated at twilight. That is definitely a special sight to see.

Lights which run on solar power can be much more advantageous than traditional lights which are hard wired. After all, there has to be a reason why solar lighting is becoming such a popular alternative for so many people. You may not be ready to use solar lights all over your house, but that is fine. You can still benefit from using them in your garden.

It takes a whole lot of planning and care to put traditional, electric lights in your garden. More often than not, you have to involve the help of an electrician. As many of us know, that can be extremely costly. Then, too, you have to consider all the necessary planning. The wires used have to be placed somewhere – somewhere safe at that.

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