Smoky Halloween Graveyard

Spooky Backyard Mausoleum

Disclosure: I partnered with the Home Depot for this Halloween Style Challenge but all frightening opinions are my own.

It doesn’t get much more epic than a 12-foot Halloween skeleton and a 6 foot animated gravedigger! When Oliver and I built our backyard playhouse, we could never have imagined it surround by a giant skeleton and smoky gravestones. The Halloween figures are beyond realistic this year and my kids are in love with all of our new spooky friends. The Home Depot gave me the graveyard theme for this year’s Halloween Style Challenge and all of the options were SO good.

To set the stage, I dug out two piles of dirt because… graves. The gravestones are super lightweight and easy to install but look SO realistic. Truthfully a lawn covered with these headstones would have been spooky enough! To add to the scene, I used flickering lanterns around the graves- they look so realistic Arthur was worried they were real flames. Ha!

Hiding behind one of the gravestones is a skeleton rising from the ground. This skeleton is special because he blows smoke and gives the grave a foggy misty appearance. Did I mention I love a smoke machine??

I added some hands to a piece of plastic drop cloth to bring an extra level of terror to the playhouse turned mausoleum. The drop cloth was easy to staple behind the playhouse windows. You can’t tell from photos but a thundering strobe light in the house helps illuminate these shadowy fingers. Standing in the doorway is the Victorian reaper. When you press a button on his arm, he gives his eerie warning.

The gravedigger stands over 6 feet tall and he MOVES! We set up everything with the motion detector setting so the kids can move around the graveyard and listen to everyone mouth off. A yappy skeleton dog at the gravediggers feet makes a racket too! All of these figures can stay outside so they get turned on and activated all the time… just like old friends!

Last but not least, is our 12 foot friend, Stan the Skeleton. Oliver helped me put him together which shows you how simple it was to assemble. He’s super secure with posts into the ground and has LED eyes that blink and watch you from above. We say hi to him every time we pull into the driveway and see him looming!

It was hard not to be inspired by all the moving , talking, creepy figures this year. Not only do I love our graveyard set up, but I’m also planning how we’ll set up these guys next year!

Make sure you head over to the Home Depot Blog for a full reveal and breakdown of this super scary Halloween graveyard!

**Also, shameless plug… if you haven’t clicked on any of the items above, I’d love you to head over to see all the spooky Halloween content linked here… I get a special reward if enough of my amazing followers go visit!**