With the start of school and autumn days growing chill, thoughts of a hauntingly happy Halloween begin.  With these 7 tips for your front porch, we hope you’ll enjoy an eerily fun holiday:

1. Make a List – Think of the candy, the decorations, and the music you may want to set up for a successful trick-or-treat event on your front porch.  From your list of tasks, decorations, and treats, you can bundle activities to keep your workload light, and the howls of delight coming.
2. Box it Up –If you haven’t done so before, this might be the year to make sure you store your decorations in standard sized boxes for easier retrieval next year.  Sets of banker boxes are inexpensive and can be labeled on the outside with contents you’ll reach for year after year.  We keep our friendly ghost face up and smiling at me for the first box to open.
3. Chill with the weather – Don’t worry about how professional or garish your overall Halloween looks.  Your neighbors and friends are coming to show off their costumes, more than to judge your efforts.  Get in the spirit by being prepared to enjoy the parade of ghosts, goblins, princesses, and more.  To be confident about your front porch, just be sure to touch on the basics:
   1. Good Lighting
   2. Safe Walkways
   3. Fun Decorations
4. Front Porch Decorations – can be simple or elaborate, depending on your time, budget and interest.  One fun and simple decoration is to make “ghosts” by covering a Tootsie Roll pop with white tissue.  Wrap a rubber band around the sucker to make a “ghost head” and draw on eyes and mouths just for fun.  You can serve them up in a graveyard of Styrofoam, and hang a few from your porch ceiling with fishing line or black ribbon.
5. Set up some music – Do you enjoy listening to “The Monster Mash” or  “The Devil Went Down to Georgia?” Why not share by making a playlist of your favorite holiday tunes and putting speakers in nearby windows?
6. Keep things light – We all know the big kids love scary adventures.  But the average age for a trick-or-treater is seven. Many of our little friends start going door-to-door with mom and dad as toddlers. Try making your place festive, but bright for this young crowd.  You can find orange-colored light bulbs at hardware and Halloween shops.  And, a great way to keep safely in the spirit is to string jack-o-lantern or ghost lights along your front walk.  These are also readily available and cost less than twenty dollars.
7. Listen to the ICC – The International Code Council recommends checking your porch at least twice a year for safety issues.  This is a great time to look for wobbly handrails, loose or missing screws, split wood, or excessive movement on your front porch.  If you have a problem, call for a professional repair before your little goblins come a haunting.

Wishing you a safe and happy Halloween.

(Photo by Kate Ter Haar)