+1 for me on the same sentiments. We always enjoyed a sync'd house and listening to the kids go wow! Almost starting to get this stuff through my head. An etherdongle and a few smart string controllers are on my must buy list. I have a pair of Lynx to build (need to find the cases), and the nice pretty molded plugs as I won't really like the screw on kind and those are not water resistant from the top.
A new Aeon clock for the shop will arrive in a couple few more weeks to solder up, and then I have a pair of hubs to solder together which I gather will allow me to run all these DSC and SSC's I will have.
Pretty soon need to photograph the front of the house, print some 8x10's and start marking them up with what will go where and make a list of what needs to be bought before fall.
Yep, into another hobby goes the plunge.. I really like those singing "faces" for halloween too.