House is decorated like it’s Christmas, but with ghouls and pumpkins, including lights in the windows, which are on in the evening for a couple of weeks before the event. We use them like traffic lights on Halloween night; if they’re on then we’re open for business and then later they’re off to signal we’re done, stop bothering us. Lit pumpkins on the doorstep also have the same effect. Early evening we take the kids out and leave a bowl of sweets on the doorstep so nobody leaves empty handed. At this time it’s usually supervised kids, so no issues with the whole lot disappearing.