How to Hang Halloween Decorations Safely

Most falls come from the ladder angle, not from the height. For an extension ladder, set the feet one foot out from the wall for every four feet of height to where it rests. Standing at the base with your toes against the feet, you should be able to reach the rungs with your arms straight out.

If you're getting onto a roof or a balcony, the ladder has to stick up about three feet past the edge so you have something to hold as you step off. Keep three points of contact, two hands and a foot or two feet and a hand, and carry decorations up in a bag on your shoulder rather than in one hand.

A step ladder is for standing on the steps, not the top cap. If you're reaching past your shoulders to hang something, move the ladder instead.

A lot of houses here are stucco, and a nail or screw through it lets water in behind the finish. That shows up later as a stain or a soft patch, long after Halloween is over.

There's almost always something already on the house to hang from. Railings take zip ties. Gutters take plastic clips made for them, which slide onto the lip and come off in January without a mark. Existing light fixtures, hose bibs and fence posts all work as anchors. Adhesive hooks don't hold well on textured stucco, and they tend to let go on the first damp night.

Don't tie anything heavy to a gutter. The gutter is held on by the fascia, the board it's nailed to along the roof edge, and a figure catching wind can pull both loose.

The outdoor outlet has to be a GFCI, the kind with test and reset buttons. It cuts power in a fraction of a second if current leaks to ground, which is exactly what happens when a plug sits in a wet lawn. Press test, then reset, before you plug anything in. If it won't reset, don't use it.

Look at the cover too. An outlet that stays plugged in all month needs an in-use cover, the bubble type that closes over the plug. The flat flip cover only protects an empty outlet.

Most outdoor outlets share a circuit with something, often the porch light or a garage outlet. A standard 15 amp circuit handles about 1,800 watts, and for things that run all evening you want to stay under about 1,400. Inflatables run a blower the whole time. Fog machines draw a lot while they heat up. Add the wattage from the labels before you plug it all into one place.

A few habits that save the evening:

• Use cords marked for outdoor use (a "W" on the jacket) and the shortest length that reaches.
• Don't chain cords end to end. Run a second cord from a second outlet instead.
• Keep every connection off the ground. Lift it onto a brick or hang it from a stake.
• Never staple or nail through a cord to hold it down.
• Put the whole display on an outdoor-rated timer so nobody forgets it at 2 a.m.

October here brings Santa Ana wind, and an inflatable is a sail with a motor in it. Use every stake and tether that came in the box, and add more if the ground is soft. Tethers go out at an angle, not straight down. Keep inflatables clear of the street and the neighbor's car, and switch them off if the forecast calls for wind.

Put LED candles in the pumpkins. Real flames next to dry leaves, costumes and a porch full of kids is a bad mix.

Everyone forgets this part. The first week of November, the inflatable is lying in a wet lawn and nobody wants the ladder out again.

Pick a dry day. Cut zip ties rather than yanking them off the railing, and pull gutter clips straight off the lip. Dry everything before it goes into a bin, and label the bins, so next year's setup takes half the time. If holiday lights go up next, it's the same ladder and the same clips, so it's worth doing both in one trip.