Since I haven’t been able to run I’m going to start reporting on some of my other creative ventures.

This Halloween I got a lot of compliments on my life size scary reaper.

This DIY cloaked figure is fairly easy to make and you can customize it to make it your own. It should cost you around $35 to make. There are a bit of ingredients, but hopefully your already have a lot of the ingredients around the house.

What you will need:

1. some wood. You can use 2×4, 1×4 or really anything you have sitting around in your garage. As long as it’s long enough.
You’ll need two pieces that are roughly 5 ft long and a few shorter pieces for arms and head.
If you are going to buy it I’d recommend getting 3 pieces of 2×3 x8 – you can get it for 2 bucks a piece.
(Alternatively you could use PVC for the structure)

2. fabric – You can get a cotton/polyester blend for roughly $4 per yard. You’ll need about 7 yards – $24
3. screws and a screwdriver. some basic woodscrews are fine.
4. staple gun and staples.
5. Mask of your choosing – something you don’t mind having out in the elements. I used a cheap kiss type plastic mask. You can also use masks from years past. It might even work out better because your friends might think it’s you out there.
6. old work gloves – you can use other types of gloves, but I like work gloves or cotton black gloves. You can normally get the cotton ones 2 for $1 at the dollar store or 5 below.

these last couple are optional. I used them on mine, but depending on how you want your guy to look you can use a variety of items.
7. creepy cloth – you only need a small piece. If you find it on sale you might as well buy a yard because you can use it for all kinds of neat holiday decorations – Hang around house, put over paintings, over lampshades, etc.
for my guy I used a 3 inch by 50″ piece.
8. rope – I had some rope in my garage. I tied it into a noose (hangman’s knot)
9. wire hanger (or two)

Time to build. Let’s start with the basic structure:

take your 3 pieces of wood and cut a foot and a half off of each one. You should now have 3 pieces of 6.5 ft 2×3.
Hammer 2 into the ground about six inches deep. you could make your life easier by slightly sharping the wood, but it isn’t really necessary.

cut your remaining piece of wood into a few more 1.5 foot sections.

take one of the short 1.5 foot pieces and screw it parrallel to the top of the pieces you just hammered in. This will be your shoulders.

now screw your other 1.5 foot piece of wood in the middle of your shoulder piece. This will be for the head. In mine I used a flexible piece of lattice I had in the garage.

Connect (screw) 2 more 1.5 foot pieces on the end of the shoulders piece for arms/biceps. 2 more for forearms.

Now put your gloves on the end of the wood.
Optionally – you can get crafty with some duct tape and wire hangers to make moving shoulders, elbows, wrists, fingers.
I used some pliers to bend hangers into finger so my guy could grasp items (weapons, sticks, small children)

You should now have a stick figure resembling a tiny burning man.

Almost done!

measure twice, cut once
You should have a giant piece of fabric that is roughly 21 feet long (7 yards) and 5 feet wide.
you’ll be cutting it into 2 pieces. One piece will be used to cover the body of the stick man, the other will be used as a hood and over the arms.

Much like a Mexican poncho you are pretty much just cutting a whole in the center of one of the pieces and putting it over your stick man. It should be on the shoulders and touching the ground in the front and back.
use your staple gun to fasten it to the legs, shoulders, etc. don’t need to kill yourself. A few staples should be fine.

Now attach your mask to your head piece.
tie some rope or creepy cloth around the wast area to give some definition. I put some creepy cloth around the neck to give it a little something extra.

next piece of cloth.
The center should go over the mask/head and the ends connect to the end of the gloves.
use your staple gun to attach.
You’ll also use your staple gun to attach it to the shoulders and head piece.
I cut some frays in my cloth at this point to give it a more tattered look.

that’s it. you should have a large creepy figure for your lawn.

I found a large down branch to use as an adornment. You could just as easily use a plastic sward, pitchfork or sickle.
You could also add your own touches like a severed head or one of those creepy baby zombies.

You can also put a smoke machine nearby along with a strobe light to really send it over the top on Halloween.

If you end up trying this out – send pictures!