ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Thanksgiving usually means it’s time to put up your holiday light displays – and you may have that one neighbor who goes all out.

Odds are, they probably don’t go as all out as the Bugg family.

In the early-1970s, the Bugg family started the tradition of decorating their home, near Menaul and Pennsylvania. Norman Bugg made sure it got bigger and better every year.

“He loved Christmas,” Matt Bugg said, “so he wanted to do it right. But he didn’t want just the lights. He wanted to do these displays. He thought that was so fun to do.”

The display became so popular and brought so much traffic to the neighborhood that the City of Albuquerque actually forced the family to shut down the display in 2002.

“We thought about getting rid of this for years, and then after all the harassment, you can only handle so much harassment,” Norman said.

“It was hard when we shut this down. It wasn’t Christmas to us anymore, but it was just too awkward trying to fight them,” Matt said.

The family donated their hand-crafted displays and the collection moved from place to place. Finally, it found a somewhat permanent home at a museum in Belen.

Then, last year, the people running the museum decided to retire and gave everything back to the Bugg family.

“It took almost two [or three] huge U-Hauls. It would have been the semi truck load,” the family said.

Getting all of this set up again after over 20 years was a labor of love, both for the community and for Norman.

Norman passed away in 2018.

“I think he’d be kind of cracking up right now, I think so. He goes, ‘I didn’t want you guys to do that again,'” the family said.

The family is inviting the public to come enjoy their display again, starting Friday night.

“The joy on the kids’ face is the biggest thing. We enjoy this. It’s work, it’s fun. It’s kind of like we put our whole life into it,” they said.

People are already promising to come from pretty far away too.

“There’s been comments on Facebook that they’re gonna travel a couple 100 miles to see this display,” Jared Bugg said.

Everyone is welcome to see the Bugg family’s display. You can see it throughout December and, if you do, they’re encouraging you to bring a nonperishable food item for donation. They will then give it to a local food pantry.