Silverhill family builds pirate ship for Halloween

Posted

SILVERHILL — At this time of year, you expect to see homes decorated for Halloween. What you might not expect is a massive pirate ship coming through the fence in someone’s yard.

But that’s exactly what you’ll find driving down Sixth Street in Silverhill at the home of Steve and Denean Anthony.

“We’ve always decorated for Halloween and we’ve always gotten a lot of trick-or-treaters every year,” Denean Anthony said. “It’s just a fun activity for everybody.”

Since they moved into their new home, which is located close to town hall, which has hosted a trunk-or-treat on Halloween for the past few years, they decided to step up their Halloween decorations.

“Everyone on our streets decorates and we all come out to hand out candy,” she said. “You don’t have to be a kid to enjoy Halloween.”

When her husband Steve had some leftover pallets, Denean Anthony said the idea just came to her to build a pirate ship out of them.

“We already had all the skeletons and try to do something creative with them every year,” she said. “A pirate ship just seemed like the natural thing to do.”

With the help of their children and her mother, Mary deLaunay, they began to put everything together.

They took the pallets and covered them with tarps from the Habitat ReStore in Summerdale. They took flowerpots from Absolute Greenhouse in Foley and made cannons with them. Denean Anthony also went to Dollar Tree in Robertsdale and bought a basket to hold pirate treasure.

Other items like jewelry and coins for the pirates’ “booty” were items they already had in the house or in storage, she said.

They also set up green spotlights to give the whole thing an eerie glow when lit up at night.

“We just had fun with it,” she said.

Once Halloween is over, Denean Anthony said, the skeletons will go back in their closet, but the larger display will remain up at least through Christmas.

“We’re going to hang lights and make a Christmas display out of it,” she said. “We can leave that up for another four or five weeks, then we’ll put everything up for next year.”