Best holiday lights + festivals in USA

Holiday festivals and displays seem to get bigger and better each year. Of course, the most famous ones are the Rockefeller Center tree and department store windows in New York City, but even small towns are able to transform the Bah Humbug among us into believers. Take the kids, take yourself, to some of the best holiday light shows and festivals in the USA —

Syracuse, New York — Syracuse’s Lights on the Lake, a two-mile drive through one of the largest and most colorful light shows in the Northeast;

Pigeon Forge, Tennessee — Winterfest in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, with five million holiday lights and huge displays;

Sedona, Arizona — Sedona, Arizona’s Red Rock Fantasy, a festival of nearly one million lights providing a man-made marvel set against the majestic beauty of the Arizona mountainscape; and

San Diego, California — San Diego’s Garden of Lights, a dazzling winter wonderland with over 100,000 sparkling lights illuminating the Garden for a magical holiday experience.

These are four of the 52 sites chosen by the popular family travel sites TravelingMom, created by Kim Orlando, TakingTheKids, created by Eileen Ogintz, and FamilyTravelForum, created by Kyle McCarthy. Click here to download the full list, in an e-zine format.

Photo credit of Rockefeller Center Christmas Tree in NYC is STAN HONDA/AFP/Getty Images