Yard Haunting is the most popular activity for Halloween. It involves turning your own yard(s) into an area of scares and delights for all trick or treators. The most popular form of Yard Haunting is to create a creepy graveyard in your front yard. Here are some tips that I've learned over the years to make for a more effective haunt.

• Whether using purchased or homemade tombstones, try to avoid putting them in neat rows in your haunt. Also you should try to "distress" the tombstones to give them the look of being an rundown graveyard. There are several ways to do this, from cutting "chips" into the corners and sides of the tombstones to attaching planter's moss to it. Spider webs are another great thing to add to the tombstones for a rundown look.
• If using a fog machine, think about constructing a Fog Chiller as that allows you to have a nice layer of fog along the ground for a creepy effect.
• If you're going to use a cheap (like 5 to 10 dollars) skeleton for your haunt, put him farther back from view so that your intended victims don't see that he isn't the highest quality of skeleton on the market. For that you'll want a Bucky.
• Tips for the Scareactors of a Yard Haunt: Never, I mean NEVER, touch a visitor to the haunt. Doing so could result in harm to both the Scareactor or to the visitor. There are many stories of Scareactors getting hit by visitors and of visitors hurting themselves running from the haunt.

There will be more tips forthcoming, along with pictures and how to's for making your own tombstones, and other Yard Haunt scenes.