Question for those of you with more than 10 or 12 guests:

WHERE DO YOU PARK EVERYONE??? I'm really stressing about this.

We usually invite about 30 people to our parties. We always recommend that people carpool, but of course that almost never happens. We do let people park in the front yard, driveway, and some do line the street as well. Not ideal but it works. My neighbors are also aware that I throw a annual Halloween party. At my last house though, just to make sure this was cool with the people I lived next to.. I would go over to their house and let them know that we were having a party and would be having our guests park lining the street. It was always appreciated that we would inform them so they didn't awake in the night wondering what the heck was going on. An added bonus for us was that because we took that route, no one would call the cops on us for noise.

Last year we ran into a problem with our guests parking in the neighbor's yards. We had to make people move which wasn't welcomed very happily. So this year we are going to park our cars on the border of the yard and direct them to park in between us. We think it will go over much better. Unfortunately, for those of us who don't have much land or space there isn't another solution that I have thought of. Hope this helps a little bit!

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Melissa - Senior Editor
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I live on too steep of a hill to have people park in my yard. Otherwise, I would. I live basically in the middle of a circle, in a subdivision. Of course no one wants to say sober to drive people from one place to another or I would have them park at the 24 hour Wal-Mart. 25 or so people are coming and most of them will be riding together but I still estimated 13 cars. I can park 4 in my driveway. I plan on informing the neighbors. I just don't know what I am going to do with all of these people. Did I mention most of them plan on spending the night?

I live in a subdivision, and the houses are close together, and I can only park one extra car in our drive.

However, my neighbors have throw many parties over the years, and people park in the street. They have blocked my driveway and my mailbox (meaning I don't get my mail) for half a day, and actually act put-out when I've very nicely asked them to move the car that is directly in front of my drive... so I have no problems with my guests parking in front of their house for a few hours. Any of my guests would park without blocking anybody - they aren't as rude as my neighbors.

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I'm a Halloween Bride! 10/31/2002

Where there is no imagination there is no horror.
~Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

To be honest, I have no idea where our guests park lol I live in the city on a deadend street (if you can even call it a street). There are four houses back here and 2 parking spaces. The neighbors use both of the parking spaces. We park under the carport next to our house and so does one of the other neighbors.
There are no driveways or yards in our neighborhood. All on street parking. I assume our guests park somewhere on the street in our neighborhood. We also have a few guests who bike here. Imagine that....biking thru the city in your halloween costume in October lol

MsM

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Where there is no imagination there is no horror.
~Sir Arthur Conan Doyle

Why don't you have them park at Walmart and run a haunted shuttle bus? Anyone have a big van? That would be fun!

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Yagottawanna!

There's a small lawyers office about 50ft away from my house that has 30 or so parking spaces. Well lit from the gas station 10ft away from it. So... just have to worry about folks crossing a semi busy road.

I'm assuming that everyone parked on the road. We have a double driveway which can fit 3 extra cars. To the left we have two empty lots so you could park on the street in front of them. My neighbour on the other side always has multiple guests parked all up the street so they won't have a problem with cars parked in front of their house. I think as long as your aren't blocking anyone's driveway parking on the side of the road is fine.

We have a large 80ft square paved area in front of the house/garage, and we live on a private drive with 5 other homes. While it may seem ideal, I still stress over parking as we have 50-60 guests (and yes, we invite all of the neighbors, but they usually don't come). The problem is the first 2-5 vehicles that arrive will get paranoid about parking somewhere and getting "blocked in", they they will not park in the best place that allows us to get the most cars on our property (before they will start parking down the private drive...).

My solution is $25 to our 15 year old son. I made him a "popsicle stick" flashlight (short light sabre) and I have him show the first 15-20 cars where to park. He parks them around the perimeter of the pavement, telling them to back up all the way onto the grass. Once the lot in front of our house is full, he's done, the late comer's will have to fend for themselves (!).

But the point is, if you show your guests that you thought out parking, direct them to park on the grass (no one will drive on someone's lawn if they aren't sure they are supposed to), they will be comfortable that they will not get blocked in. That, and it adds a real air of professionalism to the event, I think.

The other thing is that you could make a map and include it in the invites, although it might be too late for that this year!!!

I live in the city, and I encourage my guests to take the bus.... busses here run until 3:30 am on Saturdays, so they don't have to leave early. I encourage everyone to bring sleeping bags and pillows so they can crash at my place.

The people that drive, park on the street, because the visitor parking in our subdevision is always full

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