In 2022 I bought one of those 12′ skeletons from Home Depot. Those skeletons are so tall and unwieldy that I had to call my buddy Jeff to come help me assemble it. We stood it up in front of my workshop facing the pool and strapped it to one of the porch’s support beams after a gentle wind blew the whole thing over. The skeleton is so tall that you can clearly see it over the fence when driving down the main road behind our neighborhood. I’m sure the neighbors were pleased. I left him standing the entire month of October, and after Halloween passed I wasn’t looking forward to disassembling him and realized the ceiling in my workshop is just tall enough for me to store the skeleton without taking it apart.
This is a great solution if you’re lazy and happen to have a workshop with 14-foot ceilings, but it took up way more space than you would think. The base is like 4’x4′, but his arms stick out and it was a pain to work around for an entire year. I decided that in 2023 after setting him out again for Halloween I would figure out a way to break him down and and store him.
That solution came in the form of a gigantic Christmas tree bag, which Susan and I found at a garage sale for $5. Home Depot sells a skeleton storage bag for around $40, so this was a much cheaper solution. Some people store them back in the original box which takes some serious Tetris skills, and the box is pretty large (many people buying the skeleton complained the box wouldn’t fit in their hatchbacks or SUVs). Whether they’re standing up or just a pile of disassembled bones, 12′ skeletons take up a lot of space.
In 2023, we did not leave the skeleton in the backyard like we did in 2022. Instead, we put him in the front yard — like, right in front of our porch. I secured him with some bungie cords and there he stood, all through Halloween. To say I wasn’t looking forward to disassembling the skeleton is an understatement. I procrastinated so long that he stood there all the way through November, too. Susan joked that she was going to put a pilgrim’s hat on his head and a giant turkey leg in his hand. If I lived in the middle of nowhere I would own a few of these things and I would leave them up year round (lots of people do). Unfortunately I live in a neighborhood with an HOA and while nobody ever said anything as I left a 12′ skeleton standing though Halloween, Thanksgiving, and into December, I felt like I was pushing my luck.
There are lots of videos explaining how to assemble these things and surprisingly almost none showing how to take them apart. I definitely could not have done this without Susan’s help (and gentle coaxing that got a little firmer with each month that passed). The easiest way to take these things apart is to lay them face down onto “something” (we used plastic saw horses) and start from there.
These skeletons are essentially made up of hollow bones that slide around a metal frame that snaps together. We labeled each bone and piece of metal tubing we removed in hopes that we’ll be able to reassemble him next year.
The bag we purchased was large and roomy and had enough room for everything except ol’ skelly’s head, which I wanted to set out in the workshop anyhow.
In real people ribcages are great for storing organs. This guy’s ribcage turned out to be a great place to store his arms and legs.
Everything came apart as planned. The only potential issue we encountered was when a single, slow, sleepy hornet crawled out from the skeleton to see what was going on. He was so cold and moving so slowly that Susan was able to detain him with a piece of duck tape. Sorry, buggo. We didn’t see any signs of a nest anywhere but there’s always the chance we may find a surprise in the spring.
As of now, skelly (who has multiple names at this point including Mr. Sprigs and Gerald, among others) is being stored in three parts. His head’s in my workshop and the metal base along with the red bag is in the garage. Hopefully all those things will find one another next fall and Skelly will live again.
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