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player ready...Grace and Chris Winston know a thing or two about scaring the heck out of people for Halloween. After all, the Oak Park couple started decking their house ghoulishly out 18 years ago, after they moved to the village from Chicago and realized how many kids were in their neighborhood.
“We turn our house into a ‘Haunted Hospital,’ complete with operating tables, a blood bath, a haunted hospital cafeteria [where the special on Halloween is bloody fingers, half hot dogs on pretzel sticks dipped in ketchup], and a cemetery for patients who don’t make it,” said Grace Winston. “The decorating has continued to grow and evolve over the years.”
They don’t put it out all at once, though.
“We’ve learned that it’s most fun to put a few things out at a time over the course of a week, and that usually happens during the first week of October,” said Winston. “Kids come by each day looking for new things and often ask if we’ll be bringing out some of their favorites from the year prior.”
Thanks to folks like the Winstons, decorating the exterior of one’s home has not only become quite fashionable, but it’s also big business at holiday time. People tell the family all the time that their house has become known either as “The Halloween House” or “the place with all the Christmas stuff” or both.
But either way, to Winston, it’s a “wonderful compliment.”
“People of all ages come, and they all have such nice things to say,” she said. “We actually get such a kick out of the dogs that walk by with their owners, too. We have talking rocks and other motion-sensored things that often, literally, make the dogs jump.”
But it’s the kids that keep them going.
“The most fun, though, is to see kids come back year after year, and to see how much they’ve grown over the course of the year,” said Winston. “Kids who were once quite scared to even get near our house will now bring younger siblings and say, ‘When I was young I wasn’t that scared. This is all just for fun.’ We do all this for the families in the neighborhood, and our two sons who are now 15 years old, and 11 months old.”
The Winstons enjoy the monumental task “tremendously.” By now, they are experienced do-it-yourselfers when it comes to decorating.
But not everyone has as much fun as they do at Halloween time. To some people, like me, the mere thought of trying to get all that decorating done is frightening.
I’d love to get freaky for Halloween but don’t have the time or the know-how. That’s where Scott McAdam, president of McAdam Landscape Professionals in Forest Park, comes in.
“The things we do are very basic,” said McAdam, who’s been in business since 1979. “It usually revolves around pumpkins, straw bales, corn stalks, fall planters, kale, cabbage and mums.”
Like the Winstons, McAdam has been doing these sorts of displays for years, usually when people call him because they’ve run out of time. Also, it can get costly, because there are lights and other displays involved, he said.
But that’s not the case for those just wanting a bit of seasonal dressing for their place.
“Fall decorating is easy,” said McAdam. “Straw, corn stalks, seasonal color such as mums, kale, cabbage are used to decorate entrances, mail box areas, fence corners are all easy. The cabbage and kale can last into December.”
It all sounds so pretty rather than spooky, doesn’t it? I love the fall décor. I asked McAdam if a person was thinking of selling their house, how does he think some nice seasonal landscaping would add to its eye appeal?
“I think if it is tastefully done, it can add to its curb appeal,” he said. “I would not consider a huge investment into the Halloween decorations to create curb appeal because you may limit your buyers. I think more of a fall arrangement would be better, as this can be relevant for months, not just weeks.”