In 2023 and 2024, our Halloween theme was the circus, featuring around 30 characters. I repainted every mask and animatronic for the display, and we also built a custom circus train. The engine featured a moving jaw and a fog machine, while the first car—a lion cage—was crafted from an old canopy bed frame and fiberglass foam board. Inside, two lion heads peeked out from a black curtain and moved back and forth. The third car was an open flatbed filled with hay and pumpkins.

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The character lineup included a lizard man and a two-headed man (both created from altered zombie masks), a "fat lady" that made fart noises (much to the delight of neighbors and passersby who would pull up just to trigger her), a bearded lady, multiple clowns, a Ferris wheel (purchased), a Medusa head (an altered statue), Moolissa the dancing cow (an original character), a giant pumpkin man ringmaster, various rats, two lions, an organ grinder (another original creation), three monkeys, a jester, and more.

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We also built a giant elephant head out of chicken wire, spray foam, and utility fabric. Using scrap wood, a steel bar, skateboard wheels, counterweights, and motors, we rigged it to hang its head over our fence at night, complete with an audio box playing elephant sounds. Interestingly, in 2025, Costumes.com stole our design, releasing a smaller version that required a human to operate it!

Our prop-building history goes back further, too. In 2019, we built a 14-foot giant pumpkin man. When we bought the Home Depot 12-foot skeleton in 2020, we immediately altered it into another pumpkin man, whom we later dressed up as our circus ringmaster.