[Pumpkin215]

A post on the Home Depot thread really made me laugh. One poster was caught red-handed with a horse skeleton by her husband and had to explain the large box.

I was at HomeGoods last night and waited until hubby’s back was turned to sneak my 3 candles into the house. I’m a Halloween candle hoarder. We disagree on the term "too many".

What purchases have you made that had to be “explained” in some way to a significant other that may not understand your obsession?

Last year I got caught purchasing the Grandin Road “Animated Towering Macabre Witch” that is as tall as the gutter. I had said I wasn’t going to buy her, but then found a coupon, and had free shipping…….so…...

The box shows up and hubby wants to know where she is getting stored the rest of the year. He shook his head when I pointed out we would have more room in the shed if we got rid of the lawn mower.

(Note, these are supposed to be funny examples. I’m not trying to promote buying props in lieu of paying your mortgage or encourage deceiving people with purchases).

 

[Bella LaGhostly]

Ha! I've literally lost count of how many times this has happened to me in recent years. Last year I rhink it was the large metal hearse from Home Goods, the year before it was the Headless Horseman from CVS.

What a relief to know there are others who share my secret shame!

 

[amuck amuck]

I got caught today. Three boxes from UPS! Mickey Halloween Party t shirt, Amuck Amuck Disney T shirt and two boxes of blow molds. I get in trouble late at night when he goes to bed early. Thankfully he has his got caught moments when packages for his hobbies arrive.

 

[Jenn&MattFromPA]

Oh, man... I am always tip-toeing with Halloween purchases. I do really, REALLY well at shopping cheaply & on budget almost all year, but Halloween stuff is my Krypton. Not only do I like to buy decorations, props or other "done" items, but I tend to buy supplies & items that I can use to "do things with", so I end up with lots of projects in addition to actually putting it all up.

DH is relatively tolerant. He loves Halloween too, but not so much the smaller things that I am sometimes buying. He may like to see the mantel decorated, but probably doesn't care too much what's up there, you know? He's all about the outside stuff like his foggers & bigger props.

One recent thing was that I bought a couple of styro coolers from the dollar store with the intention of using them to make some graveyard pieces. He got super annoyed when he saw me bring them in, because he said there's a whole pile of styrofoam stuff in the shed (which there is) and that we don't need any more. I said I had a plan for all of it (which I do), but you know there's never enough time to do it all!

Another thing he rolls his eyes about - I like putting my kids in matching holiday pajamas for Halloween & Christmas. They are still little so I can get away with this, but I know I won't get to do it forever. So he'll see a box arrive from online and say "Geez, did you buy more pajamas?" and sometimes he's right! LOL! I mean, it's like 2 pairs each for Halloween and maybe 3 pairs each for Christmas, so it's not a lot, but I know it's not a "need" - I just want them. In my defense, I do make my kids pose for pictures in them! LOLOL!

Styrofoam & boxes are things he hates to store the most, though. He does know that things may turn out great - I mean, he didn't complain about the cool cemetery columns I made out of diaper boxes, styro coolers & plywood scraps once it was done - but he hates storing the supplies for it all in the meantime. I probably do go overboard in stuff though, because I think "OH, I can use this!" and then suddenly I've got 18 coffee cans or 26 empty tea bottles. Oops....

 

[RedSonja]

Luckily my husband is pretty tolerant about my Halloween "shopping". He knows I'm frugal about it. Plus, I'm the one who's good at organization and the only things that are organized in our garage is the Halloween stuff! It is getting a bit out of control, though, even for me! Our house is just too small. There's no more room and sometimes I find myself "sneaking" things in just so he won't wonder where they are going to go! Ha

 

[HalloCat]

My husband just rolls his eyes. He doesn't have an issue with me buying Halloween stuff because I do it on the cheap and his hobby (motorcycles) is WAY more expensive then mine lol.

 

[CrypticCuriosity]

It usually goes something like this:

Boyfriend: Use the cash in your wallet to buy -insert thing-
Me: uuhhh I only have X amount
Boyfriend: What? what happened to it?
Me: *glances vaguely in direction of pile of new Halloween decor*

He usually laughs about it, especially my need to downplay how much I spend

 

[Windborn]

We have a deal - I don't ask her how much she is spending on her vinyl collection and she doesn't ask me how much I spend on Halloween!

 

[hopelesslyinsane]

Haha I had almost that same conversation with my boyfriend today, CrypticCuriosity!

He gave me half of my Halloween budget just a few days ago and I'm already through most of what he gave me. I think I'm down to 20 bucks or so. On the plus side our house is gonna look amazing!

 

[LairMistress]

We had three boxes on the porch the other day and all were for me! I got grumbles over that. So today, I came home from work and there is a 3 ft tall box on our porch! What the heck is that?? Heavy too. And, mailed to HIM. That would be a $250 Polar Express train. I don't feel so bad about my Halloween purchases, now!

And I was just thinking that I hadn't yet snuck my motionette witch inside, she's still in the car. So I decided I'd go get her, and then realized that he has the car. I still winced, even though she was only $4 at Goodwill, and still has the tag on!

 

[Muffy]

Glad to hear I'm not the only one that suffers through this! Joe never has seen what I buy and I do buy all through the year, mostly building materials in the off season. I use to really frequent the Goodwill, the Salvation Army, garage sales and the flea markets but since I can't walk any more that has all changed. Fortunately we have one flea market you can drive through.

Jerry takes me to do all the shopping but since he had this operation Joe has had to take me around. I got a lot of stuff online this year but still saw things on the forum here in the store threads that I knew I wanted. I kept telling him I had to get to Home Depot......originally I had ordered the skeletons online, everything came from that order except the skeletons and I saw them at Home Depot when I went to buy the steer head.

He's been putting it off taking me for a week now so I told him I'll just pay more and buy them around here so we don't have to make the 45 mile trip up there. Well that got him going. So I told him every year Jerry lets me stop at all the stores to see what they have for Halloween. When we got there he asked....How many places are we stopping at? I replied.......Six.....on this street. His whole head got red!.

First I stopped at the stores I had credit cards for.....when I came out of Home Dept the cart was covered with skeletons. I kept telling him I'm going for Skeletons! Next was Target.....had a small bag there. Then came Michael's. and across the street to Ross & Home Market. I came out with bags....he knew I paid cash there. Then down the rode to Spirit Halloween. Finally we headed home and stopped at Dollar Tree, another bag! Ouch.

He made it through that afternoon and he did well! I made him a very very good dinner!

 

[hopelesslyinsane]

This seems like the best place to share this little story, but apparently my father-in-law had quite the laugh as I walked to the car carrying three giant bags from Spirit today. We went to 5? different stores, I think. I don't remember now Hoping to hit more stores this weekend and start my big project this year - a cemetery fence! Boyfriend was pretty hangry by the end of it all but my father-in-law got a kick out of it. I don't really get in trouble for spending too much money but I certainly need to watch how much time I spend in stores and how many I visit. Oops.

 

[HeathenHeart]

Thankfully my Girlfriend and I are both Halloween People but we have an arrangement that she gets the inside and I get the outside. It bears mention that I now have the short end of the stick, tho! We came to this agreement at our old house which had a large lawn and the current house has a modest one (with a neighborhood community board who limits how much can be put out on display!)

I was never a HUGE haunter to begin with but I have to get a little creative with my display now to stay within the land/community restrictions. I guess you could say I don't hide stuff from my girl but my NEIGHBORS!! (well the nosey ones anyhow)

 

[lizzyborden]

My hubby contributes to my obsession by bringing me home anything Halloween related he finds. I don't spend a whole lot, but he never asks, though I do feel guilty at times. I too have a bad habit of keeping stuff for future projects like cardboard, styrofoam coolers and formula cans (which make excellent organizers and are the perfect size for hot glue sticks.

 

[Dinobuzz]

I'll let you guys know how well it goes once I put out the blow molds decorations closer to Halloween....