# How long?



## Sickie Ickie (Jun 20, 2006)

How long does it take everyone to set up their display or haunt for halloween?


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## Wyatt Furr (Jun 5, 2006)

Two weekends
Only because I am fussing and changing things at the last minute
adding a new bit here or there,touching up paint.
Half the fun is the set-up
October is always great weather here, so I enjoy being outside


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## Big Howlin (Jul 15, 2006)

*Yeah I'm usually adding things through out the month. But I typically spend a whole day off to set up the place. Then again, its an apt lol.
So about one day.*


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## Ghostess (Aug 21, 2005)

It takes me a few weeks to put it together, I work on stuff as I go- plus it's my whole house and we still have to live in it..lol


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## slimy (Jul 12, 2006)

I'm going to start the last week of Sept. That gives me one more week to get everything out. 

Put out fences and static stuff out first, more expensive and delicate stuff later. 

I build a lot of stuff where it goes, then tear it down to store it. 

I don't see how a lot of you do 'day of' set ups. You people are my heroes. I'll work on it all month.


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## NickG (Sep 12, 2006)

assuming everything is already pulled out of "storage" (every nook 'n' cranny around here) and it's ready to go, it takes me 3 full days to set up. typically I put out the hard to steal / stay outside stuff the weekend before the big day, and then spend all day on halloween putting up all the other props, smoke, and light, etc.

this doesn't include previous testing of lighting and all that stuff the month before.


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## Dreadnight (Jul 9, 2006)

Three days.


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## slightlymad (May 25, 2006)

All day about 8 hours non-stop hard work 

That doesnt include unpacking and testing and repairing and bashing my head against the wall......


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## Haunted Bayou (Feb 16, 2007)

I take the day to set up and usually need a few hours prep the day before. 
Usually need a couple trips to the hardware store because I forgot something or changed my mind about how I want to set something up.
I am always putting on the costume as TOTs are arriving.


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## Lilly (Jun 13, 2006)

Graveyard area 1 day so far, the 5 other areas about 1 week..that gives me time to check things over too.


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## BooGirl666 (Jul 29, 2006)

Takes about a month of nites to set up walls and roofs and full 2 days to decorate. Hey maybe this year will be easier.... Framing still hasn't been taken down on back deck. lol.


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## Otaku (Dec 3, 2004)

It takes me about 2 full days to run all the lights and sound wiring. The props go up the day of. That doesn't include pumpkin carving time, that's at least one more day.


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## wormyt (Aug 29, 2005)

How LONG??????? LOL Long time !!!!!!!!!!! Last year I started on Sept 10th.
http://tinyurl.com/33pxtc

I always start the front yard first, throne, boarded up windows, crypt, fence, graveyard, and I stay involved with the front yard until later in Oct when I finally move to the garage. I seem to think of props inbetween that Id like to hurry and make. Last year I made the count down sign in a day, which I had been wanting to make for several years but just never did. Last year I redid my haunt name after my boyfriend.....its usually The Haunt on Sanders Hill....changed it this year named after him...The VON TERSCH Asylum. I have three night vision survalience cameras on my house to record the front yard and my forth in my garage. Always posting a sign saying That I do have videos recording. But man it seems even though I get started earlier and earlier Im never done. The dot room is always the very last thing to go up usually in that last week in Oct. I seem to tinker all month long. So about a month and a half for me Id have to say. LOL


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## trishaanne (Aug 20, 2005)

It takes me a good month to set up the yard. The front yard is done first, which is where the cemetary is and this year, the band on the "child friendly" side of the driveway. The back yard is always done last..last year I think we started a week before Halloween. Then, with all the wind we've had for the past 2-3 years, I'm setting it back up EVERY DAY! Last year the maze in the backyard was being redone up until the time the first guests arrived. We are "open" for guests on October 30 and 31. Last year the maze held up through the night of the 30th only to blow down again due to 50 MPH winds that night and we had to reset again the next day. I've got a head start this year...I never took the faces off the tree from this past year and there's still a coffin out front waiting to be moved into the yard.


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## Gothikim (Jun 30, 2006)

From the minute our HOA (neighborhood nazis) allow H-ween to go out until 10 minutes before the TOTs arrive! That's about 3 weeks, but that's doing it a bit at a time. I save the electronics & delicate & portable stuff until the last day, like everyone else. If I had to do it all at once, it would probably be 2 full days.

My hat's off to the "day of" set up folks. I don't know how y'all do it! I just know that I don't have it in me!!!


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## IshWitch (May 31, 2006)

I take the whole month. I should say, it takes me the whole month.

Most of my things are torn apart to store, including bluckies. My pvc is numbered and tied together so I have to sort and match the numbers, and dig out the corresponding outfit (that is primarily the witches). I use a lot of milk jugs, both gallon and half gallon size, plus 2L bottles to fill out figures and save on weight. I throw those out after Halloween so have to gather more and cut them to fit every year. 

I just don't have the storage to house chicken wire body frames. Our attic is about nil, so that is out. I keep adding more stuff each year and am well past maximum capacity here! LOL But who uses their carport/garage for vehicles anyway!


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## Sickie Ickie (Jun 20, 2006)

We can't store anything in our carport or we get fined.


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## Big Howlin (Jul 15, 2006)

what?? who said that?


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## Hauntiholik (May 17, 2006)

I set up my yard haunt and take it down the same day. I do take the week before to test everything out however.


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## Bone Dancer (Oct 7, 2005)

Wow, I have seen the pics of your yard Haunti and to put that much up in a day and then take it all down, Mmmmm, I suspect magic is involved here.
I putter along for a week or so. And if it werent for mowing the yard my tombstones would be up all the time. They are still up as i type this in about 8 inches of snow. Looks kinds nice though, peacful .


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## Eric Striffler (May 6, 2006)

Man some of you tkae a quick time to get set-up!
For our haunt, it takes some days after school and full weekends during the end of September and all of October. Our haunt is open the last two weekends of October and draws a huge crowd because it's the biggest one on Long Island (where I live). It's a long trail through the woods, followed by about five houses, which are cabuins at the campground it takes place at.

It's pretty great.


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## NecroBones (Feb 10, 2006)

Mine only takes a couple hours to put up, but then again, my display isn't horribly elaborate. I just try to pack a lot of detail into a small space.


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## halloweengoddessrn (Feb 14, 2007)

I start in August with the inside because we have a HUGE party every year- then in September I start on the outside- it takes me a long time to get it right and dig thru all the boxes of stuff I have. I also work full-time so I have after workin the evenings and then on the weekends. Its a lot of work- but I always look forward to it and so do the neighbors!


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## Spartan005 (Mar 13, 2007)

Oh god where to start.... This past October we (meaning me and my dad, but mostly me) decided to make a haunted house in our backyard and donate all of the proceeds to YES Community Services. We started setting up at least a month in advance by borrowing two of my neigbors 10' x 20' tents and trying to get another 20' x 20' tent. However the biggest one was unable to be borrowed so we resorted to building our own tent over our deck (apporoximately 14' x 30') The two weeks before halloween were absolute hell.... winds had gusts of up to 40 mph and ripped apart our tarp over the deck. The Saturday before halloween, which was supposed to be the first day of the haunt, was the worst day of it all. Winds picked up to 60mph and Destroyed my neighbors tents. We were forced to take down the one over the deck and salvage whatever was left. At a last minute decision I redesigned the entire haunt to go around the side and back of my house and through our first floor. We covered every single inch of our walls with black plastic sheets and ran lines across our house to hang the fake walls from. It took all Saturday (9:00am - 11:00pm) and most of Sunday to finish the haunt with the help of two other people and a couple of my friends here and there. It opened Sunday night at 7:00 and we literally were just finishing putting the last tarp up outside by shoving a bunch of 2 x 4s into cinderblocks and duck taping the crap out of the tarp. So yeah.... it turned out to be great but the set up was horrible.


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## bozz (Sep 27, 2006)

I start to set up my side and backyard trail late August....with scarecrows as soon as they hit the fabric shops.....and don't do the garage and front yard till late sept.,...and yeah that wind mess us up too.....had a lot of damage control to take care of........my wife would have a fit if she could not park the suv in the garage for 2 months or I would start sooner....lol.


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## Death's Door (Mar 22, 2006)

I usually start decorating the inside in the beginning of October. I put out a few things in the front yard beginning of October (cornstalks, orange lights up the walkway and around the door) but most of my stuff goes out a couple days before Halloween and most of it is taken down on Halloween night. I do this because of wind and our house one of the main paths to the high school so there are times when I see other people's things placed in other people's yards (kids playing pranks) or thrown in the streets. It's just a precaution that I take because my props are priceless to me. Even though I have a reputation of having the coolest house on Halloween, I don't want to tempt anybody in trashing my beloved props.


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## GothicCandle (Mar 26, 2007)

All day halloween day. I get up early in the morning and start puting my stuff out, by the time im done tots are comeing up the drive.


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## Lady Nyxie (Aug 30, 2006)

Like many others, I work full time, so I end up doing set up over a couple of weeks. But, if I had to guess on the work a full day non-stop theory, a good 3 days at least. 

My haunt is pretty much only indoor. There are a few items outside. It can take me hours to set up the front window alone. Then there are at least 15 black sheets I drape up to hide the crap in my house and allow victims to concentrate on the display. Halloweentown (my Lemax village) can easily take a full day to set up. The living room, kitchen and back hallway all get done. There are at least 50 witches jars in my witches kitchen that need to be individually unwrapped, the wrapping paper saved and then the bottles set up. 

The biggest time consumption for me (and I think many of you can relate to this) is the fact that I have way too much stuff in way too small of a house. So, until I get done falling over things, cursing because I smashed my hand against the door frame while carrying a storage tub to the living room for staging, all but falling off the ladder while putting up the sheets and then drinking copious amounts of alcohol to soothe my battered self, it is definitely at minimum 3 full days of non-stop work. One of these years I hope to get help.


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## GraveDiggerGreg (Nov 12, 2006)

*one week of vacation*

Hello,

I take one week off of work, during that time, I screw around, start building new stuff, screw around, attempt to complete new stuff from last year that I didnt finish, screw around some more and panic the last day in a mass setup.


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