Menards Halloween ~ Worth checking out this year!

Hey everyone! I'm glad to be back on here. I've been wanting to blog, but had to finish backing up all the photos on my computer first. That process took several months, pretty much nonstop. My computer has been slowing down, and it seemed like possibly now or never if I wanted to get those photos backed up. I backed up my photos in a number of places, and Shutterfly was one of them. They'll give you unlimited photo storage, but you have to make a purchase every 18 months. So I created a set of coasters from some Halloween photos I took in Cedarburg years ago. I'm pretty happy with how they turned out! I'll share some photos of those at the end of this post. 

So, Menards has some pretty great Halloween stuff out this year. When you walk into the store, you're met with some new inflatables. Of course you can't see this in a still photo, but this skeleton has inflated eyes that spin in circles.

Maybe you guys have seen inflatables with these cool, led light details. The green lights in the ghost's mouth and the cat's eyes are these little dots that have a 3-D effect like they're moving inward.

I love these half skeletons! I've seen variations on these in a few stores this year. It looks like this one might have eyes that do something. 

I think Menards has really stepped it up with their large-scale Halloween figures. That inflatable witch that you're seeing the back of is 20' tall! Next to her is the Wendigo. Can you see his hooves? I think they were calling the crow skeleton figure a Plague Doctor. 

I liked that Wendigo so much that you're going to see a few photos of him.

If you lived near a wooded area, or had a number of trees in the backyard, how perfect would this be behind one? I'm getting spooked just thinking of that. 

The Wendigo's eyes light up and he makes a kind of grunting/groaning/grrrring sound.

I really don't remember what the Plague Doctor had to say. He moved his clawed hands back and forth and lit up.

Here's a close-up of the giant witch inflatable. Her crystal ball has some light movement in it.

This was a new one to me too. I'm sort of remembering someone around here having a headless horseman inflatable, but I think it doesn't have a horse.

How about the "Inflatable Skeleton Highland Cow with Fur"? I got a kick out of this. Have you ever heard of this critter as a Halloween character? Unless I'm missing a reference here... 

These inflated tentacles look amazing, if you have the house for them. You'd need enough windows of a certain size in row.

Onto the gift/decoration section. They had a few new metal signs, and this one was my favorite.

This was fun. You can rotate the planchette so it goes over a certain zodiac sign and number. Of course I had to put it on my sign and birthdate. :)

X-Ray candle holders:

This is a close-up of a wreath. I'd like to try making one of these ornament wreaths sometime. 

This guy is another talker. I think he's supposed to blend in with a tree trunk. If he was a good match for the tree, I would think he'd be pretty effective.

Sssss...

Vintage-style cans:

I'm most happy with the next photos. These are going to be from the miniature Halloween village section. The miniatures were lit up really nicely this year, so they photographed well.

The Texas Hold 'Em riverboat. I'm just now noticing the hand rising from the waves.

So here we have the skeleton witch lady with... her daisy dog? Or maybe it has a cone around its head because it's injured? Can anyone help me out here?

The "Heads Will Roll" bowling alley:

The Witchy Candy Shop:

"Scaredy-Cat" Pet Grooming:

This is either a lighthouse or a water tower. 

There was a Mickey Mouse themed pumpkin house with some cute Mickey details. See the Mickey Bat weather vane? And there's a Mickey pumpkin next to the house.

There was a Looney Tunes house too. I have a vague memory of this Franken-Tweety creeping up on Sylvester. Was there an old episode where Tweety is turned into this creature by a Mad Scientist, or am I making things up?

I saved my favorite photo for last. This is something to do with toxic waste. I'm not even sure. But I really like the way the lights turned out!

So, there's Menards for you! I think they have a better Halloween selection than usual this year. And here are those Shutterfly coasters:

They have cork backs and are super sturdy.

I recommend their photo coasters! This was my first time ordering anything from Shutterfly, so I'm off to a good start. Do any of you use Shutterfly? If so, do you have any products to recommend? 

The nighttime view of Halloween around town

After getting a view of how things look around here in the daylight hours, I thought you might want to see how things look at night. In some cases, these scenes were far spookier at night. It depended greatly on how they were lit.

This led jack-o-lantern was in a window. It looks like the insides of his eyes and mouth go on to infinity.

This yard goes with that jack-o-lantern. You can see part of him in the window on the right. You may remember this house from last year because it was so fantastic. 

I think their witch was lit better this year. I don't remember them working with so many different colored lights. 

Do you think she is creepier with most of the lights on or off? I could make a case either way, but I'm thinking this dimly lit picture is creepier. 

This picture is scary to me now! She looks uplit like she is holding a flashlight under her chin and about to tell you a scary story. I wonder what that story would be?

This skeleton looks like it is warming its hands by the toasty glow of this pumpkin.

This reminds me of Tiki figures for some reason. Yeah! I just looked up some pics of stacked Tiki heads and found a bunch of similar images. That was in my head for a reason.

A close-up of their giant skeleton with one of his sinister expressions:

But here's a more friendly face:

You can actually see some of his twisted pumpkin arms here.

I changed my computer's wallpaper to this image last night. 

This has to be so much work and I can only imagine the storage issue they might have. These people don't leave their skeletons out year-round either!

This next picture is of the backyard view of that lady's house with the scarecrows and ghost tea party. Suddenly that ghost looks a lot spookier. I think those uplit orange leaves really add something. I should mention that a person has to walk down a very dark unlit path through some trees to get to this backyard. So you're already in a sort of spooked mood by the time you make it there. I charged down the dark path yelling something along the lines of "Hey, animals I'm coming through!"

Her witch looks a lot scarier at night too. I just noticed that horseshoe on the shed. There are so many details in her displays that it's easy to miss something.

This was in my daytime pics too, but I chose to just show it at night. It looks a lot cooler at night with those shadows.

This too! If you didn't realize this bat was up there until seeing it at night, it could be really scary. I was just thinking how much scarier this would be hanging from the trees on that unlit path I mentioned earlier. I mean, assuming you could even see it.

Don't you expect this bat to open its eyes at any moment? That would be quite the addition to this prop!

Now we are on to another yard. These dry cornstalks look like a headdress. 

Spooky tree man all lit up in red. That head he's holding looks even creepier in this light.

And across the street from this house is the place that goes all out. This guy does well with the lighting. 

I appreciate it when people separate the light colors into different sections, so it isn't all muddy looking. This is nice and crisp.

Gremlin guy's eyes shine at night. 

I don't know what this is. Cousin Itt/Snooki?

I think this window went with one of the classy bicycle displays. I wonder if that is a gargoyle silhouette at the bottom? I'll have to look in the daylight. 

A rooftop sitter with a beer can:

Here's a view of how the Harry Potter candles look lit up at night. They give much more of a floating appearance in the dark.

Those lit-up bicycle wheels I was telling you about earlier:

This spider is super cool at night but it is even more beautiful in the daylight. It is made of some shiny, reflective material with all these different angles. I've never seen one like this anywhere else. The orange and purple lights behind it are part of a big web.

This lady has been going wild with her lights for decades. Every holiday, more and more gets added. She used to work in a hardware store that existed long ago in town. I'm guessing that she picked up a lot of great holiday stuff at a discount?

I think she got that Happy Halloween sign at Stein's, though. That's the only place I've seen those for sale.

I love her door, even without any lights. Those gingerbread details around that fancy spiderweb glass. The neon bat opened and closed its wings. It took me a few tries to photograph it in the open wing position.

And what a perfect message to end on! Although, we're a little past Halloween. I plan to extend the holiday somewhat through the next week. I don't know about you guys, but it feels like not everything Halloween-related got fit in. 

My next post will probably be about the great fall foliage around here and the fancy pumpkins I've seen on display. 🍁🍃🍂