It's a very Merry Christmas in Pingelly

For all of December the Pingelly Shire has transformed the town centre into Pingelly Christmas Village - and travellers heading out of town towards Narrogin are treated to more festive fare - thanks to West Pingelly farmers Catherine and Michael Hughes.

This is the fifth year they have put large scale Christmas decorations on display at their property, Geebin, which is seven kilometres from Pingelly along the Great Southern Highway, where they farm barley, lupins, canola, hay and oats, as well as Merinos.

After moving to the Wheatbelt, Ms Hughes said she missed seeing the way households in suburbia were decorated each December.

"So I decided to do it here anyway, just had to do things a bit differently on a rural property," Ms Hughes said.

"I started by decorating our mailbox originally a few years ago and the neighbours thought it looked great.

"So the next year I created my first hay bale tree, and have added more and more things to the display each year."

Ms Hughes also runs a health food shop in the main street in Pingelly which she has festively decorated - investing more metres of solar-powered lights than she can keep track of.

For her onfarm display this year, she lined an old Bedford truck with lights and used an old farm television aerial to achieve height which sits beside the 'tyre tree'.

"I wanted to ensure the display is as impressive at night as it is during the day," Ms Hughes said.

"The large stars on the hay bale stack are made from old coat hangers and a lot of tinsel.

"There are six compressed hay bales that I wrapped and decorated that had to be stacked with the fork lift."

There are seven spray painted tyres stacked on the truck tray.

"This was the biggest challenge to complete, finding the right size tyres to achieve symmetry and the correct shape took quite some time and effort," Ms Hughes said.

"The tyres came from headers, sprayers, trucks, cars - everything as I needed so many different sizes and they had to be perfect."

Ms Hughes did most of the work herself, but called on husband Michael and relatives to help out a few times.

"They got roped in if I needed a hand," she said.

"Hubby helped with the truck and I drove the tractor, but I am a bit OCD so I do 90 percent of what needs doing myself."

When asked why she puts in so much time and effort, Ms Hughes said she just wanted to brighten people's festive season.

"This year a lot of people are doing it tough, dealing with onfarm stress, financial issues, disease, mental health issues and the rental crisis," she said.

"I just hope my display makes people smile as they drive past and it lifts their spirits."

The Hughes family encourages all those passing by to toot their horn and get into the festive spirit.

Pingelly Shire chief executive officer Andrew Dover said this was the second year the main street was transformed into a Christmas village after being a popular choice in 2022.

He said being such a picturesque town centre with multiple historical buildings, the motivation was to honour the architecture and the history in an inclusive way for the community.

"We chose Christmas decorations to pay homage to our historical buildings and make them pop," Mr Dover said.

"And to encourage people from all around the shire to come together.

"We also wanted to have a Christmas focus display that was available to people for several weeks that didn't rely on our hardworking volunteers to run it.

"They deserve a break at this time of year, the format of the village has done just that."

Fireworks, market stalls, live music, obstacle courses, bouncy castle, food trucks, Christmas tree decorating competitions and one of WA's biggest blow up Santas complement the festive display.

"The blow up Santa is 10m tall," Mr Dover said

"We believe that it is the largest in WA in the absence of any evidence to the contrary.

"Santa has been very popular, as has the whole Christmas experience."

Farm Weekly wishes all readers and clients a Merry Christmas.

We will have another edition next week to keep you informed over the festive break.