Not just for only children! Info, stories and life experiences for anyone who feels like they didn't get the How-To brochure on life! Host Tracy Wallace, who has been a business owner, a successful fundraiser, a stand-up comedian, a caregiver and an animal lover, shares stories from the front lines of adulting to help others in this journey called life. She does this while finding the humor in the all situations.
A nine foot T Rex skeleton looks amazing in a Halloween yard display until you are halfway inside its ribcage, trying to connect tiny wires with sore thumbs, and realizing your “I’ve got this” attitude has officially gone too far. We’re telling the full story of how our latest outdoor Halloween decoration turned into a sweaty DIY adventure, plus the neighbor text that saved the day.
We also get real about the only child streak behind it all: the drive to finish a project alone, the pride that comes with it, and the moment you have to admit that wanting to do it yourself is not the same thing as refusing help. If you’ve ever tackled home decorating, assembled an animatronic prop, or tried to set up Halloween lights with no extra hands, you’ll recognize the mix of determination and comedy here.
And because October is not cooperating, we dig into practical hot weather decorating tips: staying hydrated, working in the shade, and a surprisingly effective trick for cooling down fast. We also talk about the bigger challenges of Halloween decorating outside, from global warming heat spikes to rain threatening outdoor electronics, plus the unexpected reward of hearing that your decorations brought more trick-or-treaters to the street.
Subscribe to Only Child Diaries, share this with a friend who loves Halloween, and leave a rating and review so more listeners can find us. What’s the wildest decorating project you’ve tried, and did you finish it alone?
Welcome to the Only Child Diaries Podcast. I'm your host, Tracy Wallace. Have you ever felt like you didn't receive the how-to brochure on life? That you didn't get enough guidance about major life issues? So did I. You don't have to be an only child to feel this way. In my podcast, we'll explore some of the best ways to better navigate adulthood while doing so with humor and light. Welcome everyone to the Only Child Diaries Podcast.
Today, I'm gonna talk more about decorating for Halloween. Yes, it's true. Can I ever talk about it too much? I don't think so. This past weekend, I posted photos of my new T-Rex skeleton for Halloween. I put it together and mostly by myself, not all by myself, but mostly. And I was very proud of that. I would have graciously accepted help, but once I got going, I really wanted to accomplish it all by myself. But that wasn't going to be possible because I only have two hands and two arms. Oh gosh. And it's nine feet tall. And the tricky part is that you have these big pieces that need to be put together. Like the whole dinosaur ribcage is one piece, which is fairly large. I think it's the largest piece of the animatronic Halloween prop, right? It's probably four feet plus long. I should go out and measure it, but it's probably at least four feet, and then it's around. It's probably well, let me tell you, it was like a cage, sort of. So I put my whole body into it because I couldn't hold it with one hand and screw in the wires with the other hand, obviously. So I thought when I got to that point, I thought I would hold it with my body. And so I got in the ribcage, and then there were three wires that I had to attach to each other and then stuff it inside before I put the rib cage onto the body. And this this was just this was not gonna work. And then I got trapped uh in the ribcage. I had two of the three wires connected, and I was standing there in the ribcage, and it was starting to really not hurt, but be uncomfortable. And my thumbs, I have very sore thumbs from years of texting and typing and doing all sorts of things with them uh game playing on my phone. I admit it. I have sore thumbs and just age. I have sore thumbs. Okay, so I was trying to screw in these wires with these little round things, these caps that go on, and then you push them in, then you screw them on. And the one that I had to do the angle that I was at, I had to do it with my left hand. I'm not left-handed, so I was
equally um screwed there. So here I am. Well, I had my phone in my pocket, and I texted my neighbors, and I said it'd be really great if somebody could come over like right now and just lend me a pair of their hands to help me. So one of my neighbors, the the wife, she came over, Kirsten, she came over and rescued me from the from the uh ribcage of the T-Rex. I must have been quite a sight. There were people driving by, but I guess it was no one that I knew in the neighborhood, and no one dared to stop because I mean, would you stop? You know, what is this crazy woman doing? In a T-Rex skeleton, of course. And I admit that sometimes I would like to, I would like accomplish it's not that I don't want to, it's not that I want to do things by myself, because you know, my friend came, my friend Marianna came over two weekends, and it was great fun because she loves Halloween, we both love Halloween, and it was it was a lot of fun, and I loved being with her and loved spending time with her, and it was just fun and we laughed a lot. Sometimes I just want to only child it, right? That's my phrase, and I want to do something by myself, I certainly would have welcomed help, believe me, on this T-Rex thing. But at the same time, it was over 100 degrees probably, and it was just miserably hot. And uh and because it's the first weekend in October and Halloween is at the end of the month, I really wanted to get it done, no matter what, right? So I just pushed through. I was in the shade, I would say 95% of the time at least. When I came in last night, I looked, you know, I went to change, took my took my leggings off, took my t-shirt off, and of course my face and my neck had color, but my ankles, my ankles between where my leggings were and the top of my little socks that aren't really, I mean, they're just like ankle socks. There was like a little tan line. I was in the shade. I mean, that's how strong, yeah. I should have just bathed myself in sunscreen, I know, but you get to a certain point and it's like, why bother, right? And I probably would have honestly sweated it all off because it was pretty hot. I what I did, here's my here's my secret, here's my secret tip for working outside in hot weather. And you'll think I'm crazy, but I took an old t-shirt, it has a lot of holes in it. It's gonna, at one point soon, it's just gonna completely disintegrate when it's on me. But I took an old t-shirt and I before I put it on, I put it in the sink and I completely wetted it. And then I went, I just stepped outside because if I put it on inside, the air conditioning was so cold, I would have probably gotten pneumonia. But I so I didn't do that. I walked outside where it was blazing hot and I put the t-shirt on and it kept me cool, and that it didn't stay wet long, and it's and it's not like I was a wet t-shirt contest thing or anything. It wasn't sexy, believe me. Because I had a tank top on underneath, and it was, you know, it was all very proper, but um, except for the holes, no, it's fine, but um, it it's all very proper. But it does keep you cool, but there's a certain point when, you know, like I know they have those uh things that you can put around your neck, the cooling scarves or something. You can put something on your head that's wet. I mean, there's a certain point when if it's 105 or 100 degrees, it doesn't matter where you are, you're just hot, you're just gonna be miserable. And uh I was drinking, I drank some water. I did, I did drink a Diet Coke uh because it was cold and I was super thirsty. And I was hydrate, I was so I was hydrating, I kept putting the hose on my head. Well, not on my head because my hair was decent, but I kept you know uh putting water on my shirt. It was really hot. Anyway, uh it was it was really, really hot. So um when I was finally done yesterday and I didn't pass out, I mean a couple of times I felt like I was gonna pass out, but I didn't pass out. And I came in and I just went and grabbed this bottle of um light lemonade in the refrigerator, and I just it was I hadn't opened it yet. I just opened it, I didn't even get a glass. Why bother? I sat down and I drank like half of it because I was so thirsty. So I
don't know. The when I think about the years past, since and this is what the fifth year that we've been here and we've decorated. There's been a day or a week or something where it's been hot, but not like this. Like global warming is real because it has really been hot this week and it's gonna be hot for longer, and I'm desperately trying to keep my plants alive. Uh, but sometimes there's only so much that you can do, right? I mean, you can only water for so long every day, and now I can't run the sprinklers because of all the stuff that's decorating the yard. So I just have to kind of go with it. Although I did see rain in the forecast, which is my nemesis. When I've put all this stuff out there, you we have all this electronic stuff, and then uh it's gonna rain. And I know that they say that most of these pieces are indoor, outdoor, and they're fine, but once they get wet, they just don't turn on, or they shut down the power for my lights and everything, and I have to just wait till everything dries out. So it's a real bummer. That is a real bummer. But uh yeah, I have the two new pieces this year, the T-Rex and the Velociraptor. But I'm not doing I'm you can you're gonna laugh too.
I'm going easy this year because I'm not doing the spider. I have a um inflatable spider. He's a big, he's a big guy, and this huge web that's like 20 feet or something, and it's been challenging to figure out where to put it every year, um, that it's not gonna get in the way, that it's gonna be stretched, you know, so that it actually looks like a web and not some lame ass thing. But this year I'm just not gonna do that because and also because the neighbors, oh, this is the the great thing, but I digress. The neighbors down the street, two doors down, they have two webs that they just put up yesterday. And it was so cute because I took the dog for a walk. It was like 90 degrees at 7 o'clock, 6:30. 90 degrees, and I took the dog for her walk because she's desperate. She doesn't realize that it's so freaking hot. So we went for a short walk, and my neighbors were putting up uh their Halloween decorations outside. They have they have a little girl who's probably about nine or ten, maybe I'm gonna guess now, and she's quite precocious, and um they have skeletons, they have a very interesting variety of skeletons. They have like um a snake skeleton, or anyway, or maybe it's just a spine, I'm not sure, but they have ghosts and goblins and a and a little cute witch. I stopped and talked to the wife a little bit, and I said, Well, we don't get as many trick-or-treaters as that other street in our canyon that they go all out. And she said, Yeah, but since you came here, moved here, and started decorating, we get more trick-or-treaters, probably because of you. So that made me feel really good. That made me feel like I've really done something to improve the Halloween spirit of the street. But I have to admit that there are not a lot of houses that I've seen in my neighborhood, in my area, or even just driving around town, although I haven't been really driving around that much, uh, where people have decorated for Halloween yet. I know I can't say it's early, but it's October. But I know we've been really challenged by the heat. So I'm gonna give it to that. But um anyway, I wonder where you live. Are there Halloween decorations? Have you seen a lot? What do you see? What do you like?
Um, but folks, that's all I've got for today. Next week, we'll tackle another topic together. I hope you'll join me. If you like this episode, please follow the Only Child Diaries Podcast on Apple Podcasts or other platforms you might listen on. And consider rating Only Child Diaries and writing a review. It helps others to find us. Please share it with a friend you think might like it as well. Visit my Instagram page, Only Child Diaries, or Facebook, Only Child Diaries Podcast. Thanks for listening. I'm Tracy Waller, and these are the OnlyCild Diaries.
