A Cumbrian vet and his family who have raised more than £20,000 for the NSPCC with their annual Christmas illuminations have returned this year with more bulbs than ever.
The home of Jeremy and Mandy Voakes in Cark-in-Cartmel, has become a glowing beacon of light this Christmas, as the couple continue to raise money for the children’s charity.
More than 100,000 bulbs have been put up on their hillside home in a display that has run each year for almost 20 years and this year includes a special tribute to NHS workers for their work during the pandemic.
Jeremy said: “It’s a team effort now. Our children have grown up with it, and now help us put up the display.
“We started just putting a few up like most people do, mainly for the children, but after a couple of years when we moved to this house we put a new roof on and hung lights from the scaffolding as a bit of a joke, and it went from there.
“If you’re going to so much effort you might as well do it for a good cause and we’ve always supported the NSPCC, so we decided to do it for them – and that gave me license to do a bit more.”
Prior to last year’s break, donations to the NSPCC had reached more than £20,000, and this year’s total is already approaching £1,000.
Jeremy said: “We’ve got more than 100,000 lights this year, maybe 150,000. The world record is 600,000, so we’re quite a way off that.
“It took 26 full days to put them all up. We started in October during weekends and the odd day off, then I took the last fortnight of November off work and had them ready for the first of December.”
The lights are being illuminated between 4.30pm and 10pm every day until January 5, when Jeremy begins the lengthy process of taking them all down, testing them, and packing them away until next year – a process which he hoped to have finished “by Easter”.
Sandra Jones, NSPCC community fundraising manager, said: “The display is absolutely incredible this year, as always, and we’re enormously grateful for the amazing amount the illuminations have raised for the NSPCC over the years.
“This year, we have experienced the greatest challenges in decades in terms of fundraising and protecting children and while we’ve adapted our services to ensure we can deal with the increased calls to Childline and the NSPCC helpline, we still rely on our supporters for about 90 per cent of our income to ensure we’re still able to do that, so the continued support of the Voakes family is a huge help.”
To see more images of the illuminations and donate, go to www.justgiving.com/fundraising/trevennachristmaslights2020
