April 06, 2013

F is for Fence Plans


Welcome to Day 6 of the Blogging A-Z April Challenge, 2013!  Each day in April (except Sundays) I will be posting here, and the posts will be in alphabetical order!  This blog is all about my love of Halloween.    I'm not into gore, so don't expect to see a lot of that.  I love exploring cemeteries, so several of those will be featured, as well as props I have made and other ideas I've admired on the Halloween Forum and Haunt Forum and Pinterest.

For some shameless self-promotion, I have 2 other blogs in the challenge, too.  Check them out!
Random Ramblings - lives up to its name.  Totally random.
The Life of Lisa - health & weight loss related

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Fence Plans - for the past 2 years I have had issues with trick-or-treating kids attempting to take the shortest route to the candy bucket in my driveway.  I know I could solve all this by simply removing temptation by taking the bucket down closer to the road, but a lot of people enjoy walking up the driveway and looking at the cemetery.  Let me illustrate with my awesome drawing with Microsoft Paint.....

The little monsters kids will either try to cut across my neighbor's entire yard from her driveway (she never comes outside and sure as hell does not have her light on for Tot!!) or cut across the ditch.  But either way - they attempt to go thru the middle of the cemetery.   If I had a hard time in broad daylight seeing all the extension cords under the leaves (and I knew their general location), then these oblivious kids shuffling thru the leaves in the dark sure won't see the cords.  I could only imagine someone tripping over a cord or a spotlight & getting hurt or blowing all the breakers in my house and/or breaking something.  

2 years ago I only yelled at one kid.  I thought it was a fluke.  Last year, 3 different times, a herd of kids tried to do this.  What got me is that all 3 groups had adults with them.  And apparently said adults did not mind when I yelled STOP - TURN AROUND - GO BACK TO THE ROAD & USE THE DRIVEWAY at the kids.   I did explain I didn't want anyone to trip & get hurt so they could understand.  

Anyhoooo, Now I mean business.  A fence.  I know that the cemetery probably won't be as spread out as much as it has been in the past, but I'll worry about that closer to set-up.

 Here are some ideas from the wonderful talented peeps on the Halloween Forum

Nice!  
1x2" wood strips & PVC & fancy finials.

This one is 7' tall - a bit much, but I like the columns.

I love the overall look here - I can't pull off the totally overgrown look in my front yard, but I like the fence looks substantial, but is open enough not to block the view from the road.   I just realized I've talked to the guy who made this - his haunt is only a few miles from mine!   As I read further, this is also made of 1x2" wood strips and PVC pipe for the verticals and the arch.  

This one is awesome that it's made out of old pallets.  Very cost effective.  And the business right in front of my work has mountains of pallets & I already know they don't mind if I take some!

I like that this one is airy, too. The gateway is cool for the cemetery name.  All I have now is a sign that I stood in front of a tree, but it broke in one of the lovely windstorms we had last October. 

This is another quick & easy option.  These stakes come in 15 or 18 foot rolls and are about 2 feet tall from Lowe's or Home Depot.  

Decisions, decisions.  
I also have several boxes of orange rope lights that I got on clearance last year that I could string across the top of the fence if needed.  There are no streetlights on our street, so it gets pretty dark at night.  This would ensure EVERYONE could see the fence and maybe give a neat orange-y glow to the scene.

And here is your cliff-hanger!  You'll have to come back in a few months and see what I've decided upon!!!

8 comments:

  1. There will always be kids and adults who break the rules - we get them climbing he fence into our community pool. Our fence looks just like that!

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    1. I don't get people sometimes. The fence is there for a reason, not for you to play monkey!

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  2. A fence sounds like a good idea, but you will need to make sure it is substantial enough to be clearly visible at night or you might just get people running into it.

    A few years ago, on a random drive in the neighborhood, I saw an awesome fence made of skis! Not the answer for you of course, just thought I'd mention it :)

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    1. Our neighborhood is fairly dark, which is why I planned to weave the orange rope lights thru the top of the fence.

      Someone must have had a lot of skis to make a fence out of them!

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  3. I have been talking about a fence for 3 years now. I am pretty sure I am going to bite the bullet this year. It all comes down to cost for me. Either PVC and wood or pallets.....since I am cheap it will most likely be pallets. Keep us informed!

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    1. And I'm sure even if you go the cheap route, your's will look amazing!

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  4. I probably sound a but jaded, but they don't have to understand. If you tell someone to get out of your yard, they need to comply immediately. Especially if they have adults with them. We have had some trick or treat issues in the last few years and it gets so frustrating..

    Dropping by from A to Z. It's my first year participating.

    Brett Minor
    Transformed Nonconformist

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    Replies
    1. They did listen when I yelled at them, I was glad about that. I didn't want to chase them out with a skeleton arm! LOL! Before I started my own display and took my daughter & niece out TOTing, I always made sure they didn't cut across people's yards, especially if they had decorations out. Those lights aren't lit up by magic!

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