Festus High School junior Gavin Young celebrates the holidays by setting up elaborate decorations in his yard.
For this Halloween, he has created a large display at his Festus home that features lights and a walk-through path with various inflatable or animatronic skeletons, ghosts, ghouls and other scary creatures.
Gavin, 16, said his interest began when he and his mom lived in Barnhart with his grandparents, Jeff and Cindy Derickson.
“My grandparents used to put out these Christmas inflatables … I loved watching them,” he said. “Every night I would go outside and have my grandparents come out there to watch them inflate.”
Gavin, who has moved a couple times since then, began creating large holiday displays at his homes a few years ago.
“As soon as we moved to (his previous home in) Herculaneum about five years ago, we had a yard, finally.” Gavin said. “Then I was able to start buying the stuff I wanted (to) decorate the yard, and every year it just kept getting bigger.”
Gavin’s mother, Toni Branscum, said her son plans out the holiday yard decorations months ahead of time.
“He drew (his Halloween display plan) out on paper in March,” Branscum said. “He designed and put it all up by himself. He did not have any help and has been doing this since a really young age.”
Gavin said it takes a lot of electricity to power the decorations, and last year they kept tripping the house’s circuit breakers.
“It takes lots and lots of extension cords,” he said. “This year we had to divide it by each side of the yard, so the right side of the yard is on one breaker, and the left side of the yard is on a different breaker.”
Gavin said his favorite part about decorating his yard is to spread holiday cheer for everyone to enjoy.
“We just love the joy that it brings everybody,” Branscum said. “He’s passionate about it, and it makes me really happy that it makes him happy.”
Those who would like to check out Gavin’s Halloween display may drive by his family’s home at 1095 Eagle Nest Drive in Festus.