250 days - some thoughts & plans for 2026

I was watching the YouTube videos that I've made for Halloween the past couple years.

I really think I did a better job on my lights in 2023 / 2024 than I did in 2025. 

I need to work on that. 

2025 was such a weird year.  It's February and the shack is still sitting out in the front yard.  Folded up and leaning up against a bench, but it's still out there.  Now it'll probably stay out there until it gets warm.  The Spouse did a great job of designing it to fold up for storage... but it weighs approximately 942 lbs so it takes 2 of us to put it away.

However, the area where it gets stored is currently filled with blowmolds and such.  So that will need to be emptied out & rearranged.  Ugh. 

The grandson cleaning snow off said shack for me earlier this month. 

I'm pretty sure he wanted to slide down it because once I suggested it, he didn't waste any time going over the top! 

At least I got the critter skeletons put into the shed (rather hap-hazardly); however the human ones are all still on the patio.  They don't appear to be messed up by spending some time under a layer of leaves and snow.   Whew!

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As much as I hate to admit it - my 2 little "helpers" (aka the grandkids) add a degree (or two) of difficulty to setting up.  Sometimes I just need to stop and think things out and having a certain little person (especially the boy!!) right there asking what he can do 1000 times (and then moving things around!) makes me crazy.

Maybe I'll schedule a bunch of half days off work the end of September / early October so I can get things done while they're in school.....

BING!

Noted.

Oh, and since I was just looking at my calendar - as you know H'ween is on a Saturday.  I'm sure we'll do the usual take the cemetery down on 11/1 and get it put away (unlike 2025) on 11/2.  Leaving it up for that extra day last year just totally derailed everything. 

I really need to control myself this year - I have so many skeletons now that the cemetery is just TOO BUSY!  However, I will be on the lookout to see if Home Depot brings their jackalope skeletons back!  My random armadillo needs a non-Michigan type friend!  That was probably one of the only places I didn't randomly stalk last summer and then missed it.  I think of giant human skeletons when I think of HD, not critters!  Funny since I got my first horse and the pony from there. 

And dammit - there will be yet another headstone added to the car plot in the cemetery.

The Spawn needs to move someplace where snow doesn't happen.   

At least I already have a rough idea of the shape of said stone. 

I also saw a FB video of someone exploring an old cemetery and there was a really cool headstone in it that I'd like to replicate.  But if I'm not careful, it'll look like a gumball machine. 

The Sign. 

I want to strip the paint off the sign (but maybe not the legs) and just leave it the bare wood like it was for so many years.  

 

I'm not even sure why I painted it to begin with!

I have a million other things listed in my notebook already.

Repaint this.

Remember that. 

Fix this.

Try that.  

Come on warm weather!!

Added - a step in the right direction!  

Last week we had some days up in the 40s and a LOT of snow melted.  So while the skeletons still aren't put away in the garage, they're at least stacked neatly up off the ground on the patio! 

All the 5+ footers

All the 4 foot and unders plus a random bat.

Ya know, the squirrels aren't too smart in my area.  

I've also found saltines on the windowsill in the front of the house, and I watched a squirrel bury something in a snowbank before.  I also recently watched one climb up the shepherd's hook to get to the bird feeder. I tapped on the window to get its attention, and it stopped and just slid back down the pole, almost in slow motion! 

Headless Todd now has a friend! 

I think I just had an idea of what I could do with them.......

😅😅