I took the lights in our back yard to a whole new level yesterday, stringing wire cable between trees to make everything more solid. (Last year we just strung the lights under their own weight).

The wires are from $19 kits from Home Hardware (they are in the hardware section near the bulk wire). Each kit has hardware and 50 feet of cable. The only extra things I needed were a couple of turnbuckles (one aisle over, if you’re looking), one for each run, and a pack of 100 zip ties to attach the lights to the cable (you can, in theory, run the cable through the holes in the lights, but everything I read online suggested zip tires are a better option).

It was a multi-step job that took a couple of hours and a lot of ladder-moving: string and tighten wires (first figuring out how the hardware works), zip tie the lights to the wires, screw in the lightbulbs.

I’m very happy with the result. We had a back yard party yesterday, and they were a delightful background to it all.