halloween yard art fun
2023 — community pumpkin patch
For 2023, I invited our neighbors to color in a pumpkin, and help us grow a giant pumpkin patch in our front yard. We received over 50 unique pumpkins! It was so fun to see the patch grow over course of October. With a little cutting, orange tissue paper, lamination (necessary for the rainy Seattle October), chopsticks, and electric tea lights, we had a very glowy and magical pumpkin patch on Halloween! Part of the fun was watching neighbors of all ages walk by and find the pumpkins that they made.
2022 — happy “hammer”-ween!
We were still in the midst of finishing up a large building project on our house (adding a second story), so I decided to lean into the reality of the construction materials still littered around our front yard. I made a foam core Hammering Man on a ladder with a construction hat. I even got his arm moving for about 15 minutes before the engineering reality of foam moving against foam made that not work anymore. But he was still fun not in motion! Happy Hammer-ween!
2020 — peek-a-BOO!
For our Covid halloween, Joshua was 2, and that felt like the perfect time to do a Peek-a-BOO! themed yard. Each day I added one more ghost to the yard, so for neighbors walking by, the challenge was to find (and count for the littles) the ghosts in the yard. I also made a Peek-a-BOO! photo booth that was 2-year-old sized. I laughed pretty hard when I saw a lot of neighbors use it to take photos of their pets.
2017 — Knock, Knock!
This year we leaned into the silly and illustrated the classic knock knock joke (see below if you don’t know the joke). We had one giant banana holding a “Knock knock” sign. And then a lot of bananas scattered around the yard. And one orange that we would move around the yard each day to make for a finding challenge. On halloween night, we lined up all the bananas on the walkway to our door, and then placed the orange surprise at the end!
Just in case you don’t know this joke, it goes like:
A: Knock knock.
B: Who’s there?
A: Banana.
B: Banana who?
A: Knock knock.
B: Who’s there?
A: Banana.
B: Banana who?
A: Knock knock.
B: Who’s there?
A: Banana.
B: Banana who?
(Repeat at least another 3-5 times, maybe more.)
A: Knock knock.
B: Who’s there?
A: Orange.
B: Orange who?
A: Orange you glad I didn’t say banana?
(Insert lots of giggles.)
2016 — gNOme trespassing!
This was the year that started all the fun. Jeff and I can’t remember who came up with the plan for “gNOme trespassing,” but all we needed were a few garden gnomes and a good spray paint sign. We still find the tiny plastic gnomes around our yard at times.
