If you can’t Beat ‘em, Join ‘em…and THEN Beat ‘em

Ever since I was about 12 years old I have absolutely hated Halloween. What a waste of a holiday! Progressively, over the years, I have increased in my ability to be annoyed at the silliness, excess of obligatory candy and junk we are overwhelmed by, and the endless amounts of advertising and products created specifically to keep us penniless.

I haven’t been outwardly miserly, just enjoyed a silent protest and an occasional negative comment here and there. As my brood has increased in quantity as well as mental ability to understand such a holiday I have had to gradually clear the cobwebs away from the cocooned fortress of annoyance I have created inside by head. Slowly the walls have been cleaned and scrubbed and piece by piece torn down.

Something tremendous happened this year, and a crack in the foundation erupted down the center. Swallowed up the whole darned fortress, buried it with a mountain, and sprouted a rose bush on top. I don’t know if it can be attributed to the weather, my increasing insanity, an early-mid-life crisis, or my increasing enthusiasm generated from the idea that my baby-making-days are over. Whatever the reason the conclusion is the same. I have decided to embrace this screwy, unnecessary, waste-of-a-holiday holiday. I even got a head start on it; bought all the kids costumes in September! What a weird-o I am. Oh well, such is my life.

So, funny thing happened. Because I started so early I have been more and more enjoying this whole deal. Costumes are bought; candy is bought, even planning a party! Yep, like I said weird-o. Now, on to my latest slap-in-the-face tribute to embracing Halloween: I have constructed a humongous black spider! It’s made out of wood, and each leg is 10 ft long. I’ve probably spent 40 hours on this silly thing; Planning, constructing, more planning, several trips to the hardware store, more planning, more constructing. It’s taking over my life. I eat, sleep, and breathe spider (weird-o). I’m sure my family will be overjoyed when I’m done, so they can have my brain back.

The holy-banana best part of the whole project—in my weird-o opinion anyway—is that the entire thing is costing me less than $20. Yep, I’m awesome.

Cut out the body base

(here's where I got to use power tools...)

Cut and assemble legs, attach hinges

(...using other various sharp objects)

Build wire frame for body

Cover wire frame with garbage bags

Attach legs

Glue on pine needle hair

(to spider, and to hands)

...then empty 8 cans of black spray paint

Mount on roof, one piece at a time

(the eyes have flashy lights in them)

(employ husband to do the hard stuff)

And there ya have it...

...one very large, time consuming spider

(and now we eat M&M's and hope it doesn't fall off the roof)