Ever since TheMisterT treated himself to a gas grill, I haven’t had a suitable use for my human ribs decoration (originally meant as a costume, but I’ve always used it as a prop). This year, I got the idea to set up a little grilling scene on the balcony with some skellies to put it back in the rotation!
I started with the grill master. I made the bloody apron years ago for a costume. It has been part of a “chop shot” set up in one of the bathrooms since then. I had picked up the cleaver headband this year just-because. The manky wig and the mini grill were around the house.
I thought it would be more fun if the grill master had a gal pal, so I went through the girls clothes at the thrift store to get a sundress. Their costume section provided the sunnies and the hat, which is actually a starched crochet decoration. Its size fit the skull better (cut not well!) than a real hat! I also got the grill master’s sunnies and clipper/tong thing at that thrift store.
Her knife was in my Halloween weapons tote as was a large mallet that I didn’t get a picture of, put it leans against the railing. I also strung up plastic chains randomly along the railing.
I carved a bit of foam packing and painted it black to give the ribs some shape, then added orange LEDs underneath to make them show up at night. The LEDs were in my stash and happened to be the kind with a timer! I switched out the rechargeable batteries a couple of times, but otherwise it was a pretty hands-off scene after set-up.
The grill master is supported what I think is the base of a fireplace tools holder that I slipped a length of PVC pipe over years ago for other skeletons. From this angle his apron gives hospital gown vibes!
Harbor Freight has great solar spots for a great price. Even with the sun lower on the horizon this time of year and us living in the forest, they get enough charge to shine for at least a couple hours at night. I use them for our slowly growing Abandoned CarnEVIL, too. Almost no one sees these, but we love it anyway.
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AIMR
(Linda -2026 time to regroup and renew :us:)
2
Man, you should advertise your scenes so that locals can come by and see your hard work! This is such a fun scene!
Our neighbor down the street has been adding to their Halloween/Christmas decor for years. We had so many cars drive through that the police had to come to direct direct to keep the kids safe and move cars through so the neighbors could get by! I know they get news coverage as well.
@AIMR Well, that’s not really a suitable thing to our situation. For a few reasons:
the scenes are in the creepy distance from the road
we live on a private road and our Road Committee just paid 1000s of dollars for road repair
some of our more paranoid neighbors might not take kindly to extra traffic
I’m pretty sure that at least 2 of our neighbors think this is literally playing with Satan
BUT it wouldn’t hurt my feeling if the other neighbors would go by just to see and maybe bring their guests along with them. We had intended to have a couple neighbors over for dinners or cocktails, but one went on vacation and then TheMisterT had to leave town and came home sick. Maybe next year!
2 Likes
AIMR
(Linda -2026 time to regroup and renew :us:)
6
The important thing is that you enjoyed making it and can enjoy it as long as you want! We still have our carved pumpkin outside and will light it until it starts to rot! ha ha I thought about putting a Santa hat on it, but forgot we have Thanksgiving in between.
Inside we definitely have some things out that others would probably consider as Halloween decor. The thing about skeletons, is there is one inside of us all the time! That said, I have managed to get almost all of the Halloween decorations down; just the trapeze skellie left. She’s a 2-person job that requires driving the UTV out there and we’re waiting for a dry day. 95% of the rest of it is already put back into storage totes. I’ve come down with a cold, so may not get the totes loaded into the loft today, but I may because I’m excited to bring out the tacky turkeys!
