It wasn’t Santa or his elves, it was wind-up merchants!
ThE mystery benefactors who secretly put up Christmas decorations ovenight at a Castle Donington home have been revealed.
Alex Mahjouri and her family woke up last Sunday morning to find their house shrouded with tinsel and Christmas lights, but had no idea who was responsible, as reported in the Mercury at the weekend.
Now, the undercover wellwishers have come forward.
Alex’s sister, Eden Watson, and their mother, Fiona, admitted they had decorated the house as a prank.
They said they wanted to spread some early festive cheer while the family is separated by lockdown restrictions – and wind their relative up a little at the same time.
Eden said: “My sister makes sure her house always looks beautiful and coordinated, while my nephews are always asking her if they can have tinsel and multi-coloured lights, which is Alex’s worst nightmare.
“So Mum and I thought it would be funny to decorate her house in all the decorations she hates as a bit of a prank in the night.
“It was mostly for the kids. They thought it was fantastic and Forrest, who is only four, thinks it was Santa.
“The best part is creating memories they will always remember.”
Eden and Fiona went out in the dead of night on several occasions to execute their plan, returning with bigger and brighter gifts each time.
Their prank then gathered a mass following after Alex posted pictures of the decorations on socialmedia social media.
Eden admitted she didn’t expect the prank to blow up in the way it did, but was delighted she could lift the spirits of so many people online.
She said: “To be honest we were just going to decorate it the one time, but when my sister posted it on Facebook and it got the response it did from our friends and family, we wanted to carry on just so that everybody could have another laugh.
“Alex just could not work out who it was and so it was just too tempting not to carry on.
“The Range and B&M must have thought we were mad, because we kept going to buy more and more decorations.
“We took videos and photos while we were doing it so when we’d finished the last time I put together a montage of pictures and videos.
“The plan was to put it on Facebook and tag Alex as kind of a sister and mum reVeaLed as pranksters ‘reveal’. Of course, by this point there were so many people following it we also thought it would be fun for them to see how we did it, too.
“Everyone has loved it and it’s been viewed way more than we thought it would.”
Pulling off a prank in pitch black was not always easy, involving a lot of forward planning and late nights.
The pair were nearly spotted by Alex’s family and at one point had to run from the scene to avoid being caught.
Eden said: “The first night we went at 1am because we had to make sure everybody would be asleep. The second night my sister mentioned she was going to try to stay up to catch whoever it was, so we got up at 2am.
“We almost got caught because my mum’s alarm went off when we were hanging lights and had to run away fast. A woman from across the street had seen this on her CCTV and said she found it hilarious. It was a struggle to be so quiet because we couldn’t stop laughing!”
Eden claimed the hard work was worth it to see her sister’s priceless reaction, and to provide some positivity after a challenging year.
She said: “When I posted the video I had made on Facebook and tagged her in it, she was so shocked she cried with laughter and just couldn’t believe we’d pulled it off.
“It is so important in a time like this to have uplifting moments, and it was lovely to see people saying that the best part of their day was coming to check what had been added.”