Residents concoct spooky yard scenes

From the Tuesday, Oct. 28, 2008 edition of the Northwest Herald:

Residents concoct spooky yard scenes
By DIANA SROKA - dsroka@nwherald.com

It started with one wolfman about 25 years ago. Lila Harris thought trick-or-treaters would enjoy seeing him in the yard when they came by for candy.

“It was a way of keeping Halloween exciting for them,” said Harris, who lives at 4410 Barreville Road, Prairie Grove. “They say, ‘Trick or treat,’ but I don’t think most of them know sometimes you’d get tricked.”

The wolfman was such a hit that each following year, she upped the ante by adding another monster or ghoul to the display. Now her residence is as much a home to the handmade ghouls, monsters and ghosts that populate the front lawn every Halloween as it is to Harris and her husband, Lee.

For some, a carved pumpkin on the doorstep doesn’t get the job done anymore. Nowadays, extravagant, outdoor Halloween decorations are as important to enthusiasts as eating turkey on Thanksgiving or having a tree at Christmas.

A top-notch Halloween display has lights, fog machines and life-sized scares.

Area retailers are stocking and selling more decorations this year than in years past.

At the McHenry Wal-Mart store, this season’s most popular decorations help transform suburban lawns into cemeteries.

“The top of the list is a foam tombstone,” said Katherine Michaels, who manages the seasonal department. “They’re very precise looking, very real.”

The prices for the tombstones range from $1 to $13, and the most expensive tombstones are 3 feet tall, she said. Fog machines also are popular this year, and cost about $15 at the store. Other top sellers include caution tape and strings of Halloween lights used to create spider webs.

But many residents are opting out of the store-bought decorations and creating their own masterful scenes.

Every year Lawrence Priester constructs elaborate, mechanical scenes with mad scientists, Frankensteins, aliens, cannibal families and graveyards on his property at 11218 McConnell Road, Woodstock.

Priester’s hobby started 15 years ago, when he discovered some machinery that made for a perfect alien scene.

“I’ve got the little aliens rotating out of the person’s stomach, and the alien’s head spinning around in glee,” said Priester, 43. “It was just an old piece of farm equipment that had two different motions.”

This year he has eight scenes spread over 2 acres. He’s been working on the scenes since September so they are ready in time for an annual, family Halloween party.

“It’s almost like a Thanksgiving or holiday for us,” he said.

All the decorations in Harris’ front yard are handmade, too.

“We build the ghouls ourselves, and we build a new one every year,” she said. “A lot of the ghouls are wearing my husband’s old clothes, or mine.”