It’s never too soon to celebrate the magic of the holiday season! For now four years in a row, Fairfield resident Alex Staikos has been illuminating his desire to help our neighbors in need by creating an incredible holiday lights display at his family’s home. Operation Hope is fortunate to be the recipient of 100% of the donations for all three years. Year 1 brought in $175; year 2 brought in $650; year 3, thanks to a very generous match from an anonymous donor, brought in a whopping $2,465; and in year 4, Alex raised an astounding $4,850! The grand total is $8,140 donated to Operation Hope over the four years. 

A very impressive amount of money for anyone, let alone a high schooler, to raise. As in Decembers past, visitors from near and far once again eagerly drove or walked by the Staikos home to see what Alex, who recently graduated as part of the St. Lukes School Class of 2022 in New Canaan, designed and built to celebrate the holidays. During the summer months, Alex is busy in his workshop, making each and every decoration by hand and hand painting them, always adding a new piece for the neighborhood kids to enjoy. In 2019, Alex won first place in the Fairfield Parks and Recreation Christmas House Decorating Contest. In 2020, he entered the Fairfield Firefighters Charitable Foundation’s “Light Up Fairfield” Holiday Lights Competition and was the runner up in the Most Creative Home category. What began as a project to bring cheer to the younger kids on Alex’s family’s street has now grown into a larger sharing of Christmas cheer for all ages. Again in 2021, people were especially grateful to have the holiday cheer, and we are especially grateful to count Alex and his family as friends of Operation Hope. Thank you for helping our neighbors in need and for bringing smiles to the faces of so many of our town’s residents. And, as Alex will be attending Clemson University in the fall, he has promised to come home over Thanksgiving and light up the street! We wish Alex all the best in his next adventure!