Thread: How much do you change year to year?

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This year, I just did a streamlined version of last year's (below).
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It sure saves time, knowing what works where, but don't want it to get stale. How much do you change yours year-to-year? Got plans for props you want to add next year?

Nice setup!

We streamlined our setup this year, mostly dropping the store-bought stuff in favor of more home builds.

We do change up some stuff, but it is always going to be a graveyard. This year we added a crypt/ghost, a few new (home made) tombstones, an obelisk, Jack o' Lantern tops to the fence columns and a stone angel.

Probably the only thing that the TOTs actually noticed was the crypt and ghost. That's okay, tho.

Very nice set-up!

We have a 3-year rotation theme. This year was ghosts, next year will be witches and the year after that will be vampires, and then, we start again... We also always keep our graveyard but we change the tombstones to "set the mood"...

The folks that change their haunt every year ....wow....I would think it might be costly to do that but hey what fun!

For us....we just enhance....at least for right now ....and we can enhance quite a bit before it will reach our expectations!

Muf

We started doing the whole pirates thing in 2001 and it just doesn't make sense to change things up now with the amount of money, time and energy we have spent on the theme. We try to add at least one new element each year and we adjust the layout slightly every year, as well. It's never the exact same display (even though the theme remains the same).

We pretty much keep with the same...can't afford to have different themes each year...we usually buy or make new props to add to our collection...but that's about it...

I try to mix it up a bit each year and just add new things to enhance the decorations from the years past. I didn't get to the post Halloween clearance so next year we will have to focus on building new props if we add anything new. I just couldn't justify spending more money but boy was it hard to stay away from the great clearance deals!

My props are all geared toward either a cemetery filled with the undead or a harvest/pumpkin patch. I expand it a little each year [usually by acquiring extra tombstones at 75%off the day after and storing them untouched for a year] and making one or two 'major' props. I'm adding a set of posts connected by chain to direct traffic flow and I'll use the gargoyles I got on sale at Target on small pillars to accent the line. this was our first year in this house so I'll make some placement changes next year. Our house sits on a small hill putting us about 8' above street level [and all the neighbors' houses!] and it gives me a cool hillside front yard for my static graveyard. I'm reworking another old crypt prop so i can add a FCG and it'll go in the side yard where I had everything this year. Eventually I want to make them walk all the way around the house--i figure it'll be about 5 years of growth before i get there. i've also started planing storage for this growth--there's a place about 30 miles from here that sometimes offers roughly 4'x4'x4' wooden shipping crates to anyone who'll haul them off. I hope to get about 4 of them. I can paint and seal them against the weather and set them behind the current shed. They'll make good foundations for building crypts and i can store stuff in them the rest of the time. well, that's the plan anyway.

I put the basics inplace and modify it from the previous year's haunt. That might mean something gets moved form one side to the other and a new prop put in its place or some dressing up of a static prop if it is staying inplace from last year. I have been expanding each year and still have alot of front & side yard to go (I live on a corner with 200' of sidewalk) so I still have the option of moving things around and changing things up. That gets tougher each year though as new props find homes!

We keep the inside decorations pretty much the same every year but try to add a little something now and then. This year we added a HUGE frankenstein portrait with red glowing eyes.
Same for the patio and front yard. Pretty much the same every year.
What we DO change every year is what we put under the carport where people enter. One year it was coffins, one year a tunnel, one year a Hard Rot Cafe, one year a mad scientist lab, and this year the organ with organist.
I sometimes wonder how long we'll be able to keep thinking of different things for under the carport lol
And props that turn out really cool....like the scarefx witch and now the organ, will be added to the yearly display.

MsM