Giant Roof Top Spiders

The first Halloween after we were married, my Hubby, took me for a ride to a neighboring community. We stopped in front of a house that had a huge spider on its roof. He said, "I want that." So, by the next Halloween, and every one since, we have worked on having giant spiders on our roof.  We have people stop and look at our house constantly, during the month of October.  We love it.  So here is how we put giant spiders on our roof.

Supplies are for the larger of the 2 spiders:
For one leg: times these by 8 for the whole spider   
2 - 2ft pieces of ¾” PVC pipe
1 – 4ft piece of ¾” PVC pipe
1 – 6ft pieces of ¾” PVC pipe
3 - 45° slip connections (75¢ each)
1 string of orange mini lights ($3/string)
Black electrical tape
PVC pipe primer
PVC pipe cement

Base:
12 – 4” long pieces of ¾” PVC pipe
2 – 8” long pieces of ¾” PVC pipe
2 – 12” long pieces of ¾” PVC pipe
8 - 45° slip connections (75¢ each)
8 – T slip connections for 3/4" PVC pipe (+/- $1 each)
PVC pipe primer
PVC pipe cement
4 - 2 inch long screws to attach the base to the roof

Head:
1 string of 7 flicker lights (available in Christmas lights area $7/string)
1 large 18” plastic ball
Black plastic garbage bag
Black duct tape
Zip ties
1 extension cord

Body:
A large 18 gallon plastic storage box
Extra Large black garbage bag
Zip ties
Black duct tape


Per spider - 2 extension cords, one being a multi plug light strip
Black Spray Paint ($1/can)

First made the base, glue the various pieces together as seen in the picture, making sure the T connection has the 3rd hole sticking straight up ready for the end of the spider leg to be stuck in it. Determine where you want your spider to be located and screw the base into the roof.  We leave the base there 24/7/365. We have never painted the base because it is white on a white roof, so it didn’t standout during the rest of the year.

We put together the legs gluing 2ft-45°-2ft-45°-4ft-45°-6ft.  Then spray paint it black, so that during the day, it will look like a black spider.  Attach the orange lights, a string to each leg, with the male plug on the end of the first 2ft piece and the female plug at the opposite end.   Use the black electrical tape to attach the lights to the leg. Create a total of 8 spider legs.

For the head, take a large ball or a black cauldron and using duct tape, attach each light bulb of the flicker light string close together on one side of the ball.  Then cover the ball with the black garbage bag and putting little slits in the plastic where the bulb will come through.  Attach an extension cord to the lights and then zip tie the bag closed.  (I know, spiders have 8 eyes but this works and we have yet to have anyone tell us that our spiders are one eye short.)

When we started out we put all kinds of things in the black plastic bags for the spider body.  We had a body filled with newspapers fly off the roof one year.  Now we just use the same big storage box, year after year.  It really doesn’t matter what the shape of the body is, long as it has one, and this works just fine.  So put a new, extra-large, black garbage bag over the box and zip tie it closed.

Now, transfer all the spider parts onto the roof.  (My Hubby does this part because I can’t do the roof.)  Put a leg in each of the holes of the base, then plug the lights into each other (they are the kind that have female plugs on the back of the male plugs) and then plug them all into the power strip.

Then we put the body over the top of the base and use duct tape to attach it to the legs.  The head is duct taped to the body and its extension cord is plugged into the same power strip as the legs.  Use plastic bags and black duct tape to protect the electric strip and plugs from the weather.

We have an outdoor electric timer in front of the house and we used one more extension cord to plug whole shebang it into the timer.  It comes on at about 6:30 PM and goes off at around midnight. 

Enjoy!