(PHOTOS): Decorating tips from Avondale Estates’ scary Halloween house
Jennifer Jones-Mitchell took this photo of her decorated front yard on a previous Halloween night.By Dena Mellick, Associate editor
Avondale Estates’ resident Jennifer Jones-Mitchell has loved Halloween as long as she can remember. Jones-Mitchell, who runs a boutique PR agency and is also an artist, started decorating her childhood home and scaring other kids after she grew too old to trick or treat.
“I grew up in Marietta, and there was a dad in the neighborhood who always used to do this,” Jones-Mitchell said. “His house was at the bottom of a hill, and my brother and sisters and I would walk down the hill and we would see kids screaming and running away. We’d just get so excited, we couldn’t wait.”
Now Jones-Mitchell and her husband, composer David Mitchell, take delight in decorating their own Avondale Estates home at 402 Kensington Parc Drive for Halloween. Jones-Mitchell says it’s a family affair. David Mitchell, who Decaturish wrote about previously for writing a piece called “Lake Avondale,” has composed frightening music to blast at trick or treaters walking to the house. And his 11-year-old daughter is getting in on the fun, helping to scare kids coming to the house.
The home has become a popular place for trick or treaters. Mitchell said one year he came home from work and couldn’t find a place to park. Jones-Mitchell says other parents set out lawn chairs in front of her home just to watch the trick or treaters get frightened.
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The couple says they normally spend six weeks setting up a haunted maze, a graveyard, and all sorts of animatronics in the front yard of their house. When Decaturish stopped by on October 9, Jones-Mitchell said they were way behind on decorating this year. But she shared their tips and tricks for spook-ifying the home on the cheap.
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