October 4, 2025 • 21 mins
Van Oaks Props is where you can get the PERFECT Halloween decorations and some tips on how to make your own. Take a listen!!!
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're listening to The Fork Report with Nil Savedra on
demand from KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Hey, everybody, it's the Fork Report, all things Food, beverage
and beyond. I am your well Fed host, Neil Savadra.
Speaker 3 (00:13):
How do you do? It? Is the season? Man? I
love the minute we get.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
We started Halloween season last week and we're gonna be
theming all the shows as we go through all the holidays,
of course, because there's just so many cool things to
do over the holidays here in southern California, and you know,
when it comes to Halloween, there's a lot of different
parts of it. You've heard me talk about this on
(00:39):
the air. I love decorating the house for all the
different seasons. I will probably bring out a good number
of things for Halloween this year because it lands on
a Friday, so I'll do the house. I'm prepping already
right now for my kids' school haunted house that I
am not overseen this year, but I am dedicated to
(01:01):
building some props for it, and my buddy Derek Young,
who owns Van Oaks Props, which has I mean, there
are so many great free resources to begin with. Just
be able to watch the videos on YouTube. Van Oaks
props that if you want to know anything about tombstones,
this man is the master.
Speaker 3 (01:22):
In my eyes. It's nice to see you again, my friend.
Always good to be here. So you just you post
it today.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Every Saturday you post at nine am, Yes, and today
was no different.
Speaker 3 (01:34):
So that's one of the first things.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
I do on a Saturday is I watch that as
I'm prepping for the show. And it was the last
tombstone of your current haunt. Because you're going to be
moving out of southern California and selling off a lot
of this stuff.
Speaker 4 (01:49):
That is correct.
Speaker 5 (01:50):
Yeah, we're actually selling off pretty much everything. The plan
really is to start over in a way and to
do things that I maybe didn't have the skills at
the time to pull off. And given an opportunity to
rethink how everything is put together and how things are
(02:13):
wired and the scale of things. I mean, you can
take a really nerdy deep dive into Halloween and I
look forward to doing it.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Yeah, that's got to be kind of exciting to have
a blank canvas again.
Speaker 5 (02:25):
Absolutely, there's few opportunities for me to do that, considering
that we've decorated our house the same way for fourteen years.
And some of that was just because I like the
theme of sort of the traditional haunted mansion esque style cemetery, sure,
but also just budgetary reasons. People are always looking for
(02:47):
a cheap and easy way to decorate that is unique
to them, that won't break the budget, and doing what
we've done has always been sort of like a good
way to kind of marry those two desires to do
something creative. But I don't want to do it where
it's really expensive either.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
So is you know with Derek, he your theme is
a cemetery, That's what you do the Van Ouk Cemetery.
Speaker 4 (03:14):
Correct.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
And when you started fourteen years ago on this particular
project where you're inspired by someone else's decorations at their
home for the holidays, for Halloween, and you said, you
know what, I'm an artist, I'm a designer.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
I want to do this for us.
Speaker 4 (03:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (03:33):
Weirdly enough, when I was in high school, there was
a haunt in Studio City called the Hallowed Haunting Grounds,
And many people who decorate for Halloween in and around
southern California will tell you that they kind of kicked
off the craze of people really going kind of overboard
with their Halloween decorations, and for me, I visited one
(03:55):
year and was kind of forever changed after that because
I hadn't ever considered the thought that I could decorate
in a way that wasn't just something I bought from
the store.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Sure, which is fine in its own right, but if
you're a creative type, you want to Yeah, well.
Speaker 5 (04:13):
And there's something about being an individual and sort of
scratching a creative itch, and those are the types of
things that I'm constantly looking for. And when I finally
had a yard of my own to decorate, they were
the direct reference point for me because they did everything
that Disneyland did, but they did it out of their
(04:36):
garage essentially, and I just thought that was the coolest thing,
you know. But prior to that had never crossed my
mind that it was even possible.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
And so you start the first thing you said was, Okay,
the direction I'm going is a cemetery. Yes, So you
knew that much that that was what you're going to
start with in the front yard.
Speaker 3 (04:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (04:59):
It always to me like doing something like a cemetery
was something that could be added to year after year,
but was also something that would be good for people
of all ages. I know a lot of people are
into gore and extreme haunts and jump scares and things
(05:20):
like that, and there's room for that, but it's not
it's not something that's good for everybody. And yeah, that's
not my scene either. I want people to be you know,
to be spooky, sure, but I don't have like body
parts laying around my house or Yeah, and it's not
a slight to anyone who decorates in that way. It's
(05:41):
not my personal.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
Because there's an audience for it.
Speaker 5 (05:44):
Yeah, but I think about it in the way that, like,
you know, I decorate the house so that people in
the neighborhood can come and enjoy it. And we live
in a neighborhood with young children, or at least we did,
you know, they're they're all in high school or college now.
But I was decorating in part for them, sure, because
it should be accessible for everyone. You know, if you're
(06:06):
somebody like me who doesn't like being startled, there's got
to be a flavor for me too. And this was
more my speed, and so I just really went all
in on creating this.
Speaker 4 (06:19):
Very moody, spooky.
Speaker 5 (06:25):
Tableau essentially that allowed the visitor's minds to do all
of the heavy lifting. I will create the atmosphere and
then I will let you run wild with it. Is
that statue a real person? What is that sound I'm
hearing over there? Is the thunder and lightning? Real or manufactured?
(06:46):
Are any of these tombstones actually real tombstone? I mean,
you can kind of go down the list of things
that it could be in anyone's mind. But the beauty
of it is that my interpretation of it will be
different from yours, and yours from someone else's.
Speaker 3 (07:00):
You know, I love again.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
You can find out more at van Oaksprops dot com
vanosprops dot com. That'll, you know, that'll be your portal
to all of it, whether you go to is Etsy
stuff you see stuff that you want to purchase, whether
you want to maybe go and find out about the
silent auction that he's doing now for the things that
he's not going to need come November, uh after this
(07:26):
year here, so he's selling off a lot of these
props as well. But if you want to learn more,
go to van Oaks Props and you can find his
YouTube stuff and all of that. One of the things
that I love on your YouTube is that when you
revisit something all. I made this years ago, and I
know more now and I have better ideas of how
I want to change it. What was one prop one
(07:49):
part of the scene of your specific cemetery that you
change that you were like now that fits my vision more.
Speaker 5 (07:56):
I don't know that it was ever necessarily not fitting
the vision. It just wasn't completed to the degree that
I wanted or that my skills allowed for. Most recently,
just because it's top of mind, we have two very large,
fake brick columns with big lanterns on top that every
(08:19):
year someone will assume they are real and lean against them,
only to find that they will move.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
I've seen them in person. I would do that myself.
They're beautiful, and.
Speaker 5 (08:30):
You know, we've had them for quite a few years.
When my wife and I first made them, they looked
the part, but they were a bit too clean, And
I think part of my esthetic is more of a
really lived in older cemetery that's maybe not being tended to.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
You want to change the term lived in, I don't.
I don't know if it should be lived in if
it's just a yeah you want it to be to
have that the grunge factor even the one, the latest
one in this video is up today. It's only a
fourteen year old technically, so you had to you had
(09:16):
to weather it for that many years, and not the
one that was you know, in the seventeen eighteen hundreds
or something like that exactly.
Speaker 5 (09:24):
Which is funny because so much of the aesthetic that
I've tried to kind of create over the years is
very much that worn down and abandoned look, which is
funny because that is sort of like the intersection between
my love of Star Wars universe and how dirty and
grungey that all is. The used universe, absolutely, and it
(09:47):
carries over into Halloween, which is what I think about
the other half of the year.
Speaker 4 (09:51):
So it's it.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
Is funny though that you you know, when you even
see like Halloween, not Halloween, but Star Wars props, right,
the first thing, you know, helmets, I buy all those
things through. The first thing you do is go, this
looks too new. Yeah you're yeah exactly.
Speaker 5 (10:07):
And that was kind of what happened with these cemetery columns.
I just thought they would look more than what they
look right now. Plus you know, they're quite a few
years old and have spent a lot of time out
in the sun, and so the colors just aren't as
vibrant as they used to be. And I thought, what
better way to kind of breathe some new life into
(10:28):
it than to really go heavy and make them look
even older.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
And I love how this and I really want you
folks to check this out at van oaksprops dot com.
Is when you see these props we're talking about, and
how people ask me all the time, well, can I
just convert the front into some I said, yeah, you'd
be surprised how things like these pillars changed the whole
(10:53):
vibe of the front of a house and and those things.
And we'll talk more about that and where to put
your energies. Maybe something to start with if you're thinking,
you know, I want to do a little bit of
a haunt or a theme in the front yard this year.
I highly encourage it. It is worth it. I don't
care if five kids come by. It's still worth it
to see people get excited about it and you know,
(11:14):
just make their holiday a little bit. So go nowhere
talking with master prop maker Derek Young from van Os Props.
Speaker 3 (11:22):
So we'll come back with more.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
You're listening to the Fork Report with Neil Savedra on
demand from KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
Hey, happy Saturday to you. It is Halloween time and
you are here with the Fork Report. I'm Neil Savedra
and I'm just into the season. And Kayla just put
down in front of me. We haven't talked about this yet.
My guest is Derek Young. He is the owner, proprietor,
maker and creative mind behind van Oaks Props. You find
(11:57):
out more van Oaksprops dot. And we're talking about decorating
for Halloween your house and stuff if you're interested in
getting started and all of that. But his wife, Erin
is a masterful baker and always sends him with love.
And you can hear Kayla and the excitement of everybody
going on with that. So what is this such a
(12:20):
This is an apple cake.
Speaker 5 (12:22):
It is an apple cake. It is a Vermont classic
and it's like old school New England.
Speaker 3 (12:28):
Wow. Yeah that smells great. Oh that's good. Just a
little pinch. Yeah, Okay, yeah, I'm gonna I'm gonna murder
that in a second. But I just wanted that's so great.
Speaker 2 (12:41):
So we're talking with Derek Young from van Oaks Props
about decorating he started fourteen years ago as a graphic
designer and everything like that, using your gifts and abilities
to decorate. But you're moving, you're moving out of state,
and so this is the last one you're doing at
your current location home, and you're going to be selling off.
(13:03):
There's a silent auction. I put in one bid, but
it was I was in a hurry that I'm definitely
going to be bidding on some other things as well.
But you know, they're just so many beautiful pieces and
to you know, have a momento like that for my
yard would be fun to always think about that as well,
(13:24):
among other things. So somebody wants to start out, what
are the you know, top five tools for making tombstones?
Speaker 5 (13:35):
Well, I guess I have to give a qualifier. When
I make tombstones. My material of choice is pink insulation foam.
They also make it in other colors, but usually four
by six we'll find it in pink, and it comes
in four by eight sheets. Oh, four by eight, yeah,
and it's about fifty ish dollars. The price kind of
(13:56):
changes year to year. But it's a weird find that
other Halloween enthusiasts who've come before me figured out made
for a great material to make tombstones out of. That said,
if you choose to make your tombstones out of foam,
which I highly recommend, I would also suggest getting a
(14:18):
small pull saw because the blade on it is very small,
it cuts through this foam very easily. They're extremely inexpensive.
You can go to almost any hardware store and get
one off the shelf for under fifteen dollars. And then
outside of that, I would say get yourself a rotary tool,
(14:40):
like a dremal, something along those lines. And with the
a rotary tool and some pink foam, you can make
whatever shape of tombstone to whatever scale you want for
your display, and you can carve it with the rotary tool,
and then paint it using your standard sort of run
(15:01):
of the mill house paint, like exterior latex paint. If
you want to get fancy like me, I like using
a masonry seiler. The brand I see most often it's
called dry Lock, and it comes in a few different flavors.
I prefer the original style, and the reason that I
like it is because it has a gritty texture that,
(15:25):
once painted kind of lends itself to a very stone
like appearance.
Speaker 3 (15:29):
So there's like a sand or something in it.
Speaker 5 (15:31):
Yeah, And if you wanted sort of the cheat version
of this, you could take some exterior latex paint. Oftentimes
you will find various shades of gray in the oops
I bought the wrong colored department at your local hardware
store and get it for you know, half price, and
then go to the park or go to the garden
(15:54):
center and buy yourself some fine playground sand. And if
you add a bit of playground sand to this exterior
latex paint, you will essentially get a good mimic for
a masonry sailer that will have that same sort of
gritty texture at a fraction of the cost.
Speaker 3 (16:11):
I love it.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
And so you have done both relief style and then
I don't know what'd you call it in carving in style.
I mean I'm engraved. Yeah, engraved, that's the word I'm
looking for, Curry, That's what I was earlier in the show.
Speaker 4 (16:30):
It's like a glimpse into my own life.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
But I highly recommend you go to Van Oaksprops dot
com and check out the how realistic and these tombstones
have weight. And another buddy of mine who's a prop
maker goes, I'm digging this segment and I need some
tombstone tips. There is an art to weathering them afterwards,
(16:58):
and what is some of the props there to make
them look like they've been there?
Speaker 5 (17:03):
Sure, so there's a couple different ways you can go
about it. I've seen it done a few ways. There's
definitely one that is my favorite, which is to basically
mix a bunch of acrylic craft paints like black, brown,
green to create kind of a dirty water sort of look,
(17:23):
and then put it into a spray bottle and spray
it all over the tombstone, and naturally, because of how
water moves across surfaces, you will get a pretty good
approximation of what like organic natural weathering would happen to
a real tombstone in a real cemetery. If you didn't
have the time for that, or you wanted something that
(17:44):
was maybe a little less messy, you could just as
easily apply paint with a brush, thin it out with water,
and drag it downwards across the face of your tombstone
and use it to sort of accent parts of it
that you find most interesting, like if there's areas where
it would look like water might collect if you're doing
(18:04):
engraved lettering, look for those recesses and use that as
an opportunity to add more character to your tombstone.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
Any parting thoughts on people are on the fence about
putting something together in their yard this year that you
can give them.
Speaker 4 (18:21):
I would say, do it.
Speaker 5 (18:23):
You are bringing such enjoyment to people you don't even know,
and I think, given the way things are in the
world right now, we need every possible positive interaction that
we can muster, and I think decorating for Halloween is
one of those things that even if you don't hear
from people, you know that you have made an impact
(18:45):
in a positive way to people in your neighborhood.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
Just as someone slowing down as they drive by and
taking a look you're going, you know what, that's a memory.
And that's one of the reason why I do the show.
It's just something that people agree on. Good food and
good conversation, those things.
Speaker 3 (19:01):
This cake is so great.
Speaker 2 (19:06):
My first thought is I want a cup of coffee
with it on a cool fall morn and I'm like,
holy hell, God, bless Aaron. She is a national treasure
and we must protect her and her gifted hands at
all costs.
Speaker 4 (19:25):
I agree.
Speaker 2 (19:26):
Wow, holy smokes. Always good to see you, my friend.
I know this is your last year doing it here
in the valley. I know it's inspired other people. It
certainly inspired me. I first started doing tombstones back in
the late eighties, eighties, early nineties for haunts that we
(19:48):
did my younger brother and I and I look back
on that and I think, Wow, everything I wanted to
do and couldn't. Then I can see in what you
do and it's like, Okay, now I'm gonna I'm gonna
get up to speed and start doing these things again.
But that motivation and inspiration is a powerful, powerful tool,
(20:11):
So I appreciate all that you do. Again, Van Oaksprops
dot com. Van Oaks props dot com, check them out.
Go through the videos. Trust me, it is a rabbit hole.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
How many videos are there?
Speaker 4 (20:24):
Five years worth? Yeah, you can do the math every week.
Speaker 2 (20:27):
Carry the linears and he has over one hundred thousand
people following him on YouTube, which is a massive accomplishment.
Thanks so very cool. All right, buddy, Happy Halloween to you,
and we will talk again soon. It's the Fork Report.
Stick around. We'll talk carving pumpkins when we return with
our special guests. So go know where this is KFI
(20:47):
heard everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 3 (20:51):
You've been listening to the Forek Report.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
You can always hear us live on KFI AM six
forty two to five pm on Saturday, and anytime on
demand on the iHeartRadio app.
You're listening to The Fork Report with Nil Savedra on
demand from KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
Hey, everybody, it's the Fork Report, all things Food, beverage
and beyond. I am your well Fed host, Neil Savadra.
Speaker 3 (00:13):
How do you do? It? Is the season? Man? I
love the minute we get.
Speaker 2 (00:18):
We started Halloween season last week and we're gonna be
theming all the shows as we go through all the holidays,
of course, because there's just so many cool things to
do over the holidays here in southern California, and you know,
when it comes to Halloween, there's a lot of different
parts of it. You've heard me talk about this on
(00:39):
the air. I love decorating the house for all the
different seasons. I will probably bring out a good number
of things for Halloween this year because it lands on
a Friday, so I'll do the house. I'm prepping already
right now for my kids' school haunted house that I
am not overseen this year, but I am dedicated to
(01:01):
building some props for it, and my buddy Derek Young,
who owns Van Oaks Props, which has I mean, there
are so many great free resources to begin with. Just
be able to watch the videos on YouTube. Van Oaks
props that if you want to know anything about tombstones,
this man is the master.
Speaker 3 (01:22):
In my eyes. It's nice to see you again, my friend.
Always good to be here. So you just you post
it today.
Speaker 2 (01:28):
Every Saturday you post at nine am, Yes, and today
was no different.
Speaker 3 (01:34):
So that's one of the first things.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
I do on a Saturday is I watch that as
I'm prepping for the show. And it was the last
tombstone of your current haunt. Because you're going to be
moving out of southern California and selling off a lot
of this stuff.
Speaker 4 (01:49):
That is correct.
Speaker 5 (01:50):
Yeah, we're actually selling off pretty much everything. The plan
really is to start over in a way and to
do things that I maybe didn't have the skills at
the time to pull off. And given an opportunity to
rethink how everything is put together and how things are
(02:13):
wired and the scale of things. I mean, you can
take a really nerdy deep dive into Halloween and I
look forward to doing it.
Speaker 2 (02:21):
Yeah, that's got to be kind of exciting to have
a blank canvas again.
Speaker 5 (02:25):
Absolutely, there's few opportunities for me to do that, considering
that we've decorated our house the same way for fourteen years.
And some of that was just because I like the
theme of sort of the traditional haunted mansion esque style cemetery, sure,
but also just budgetary reasons. People are always looking for
(02:47):
a cheap and easy way to decorate that is unique
to them, that won't break the budget, and doing what
we've done has always been sort of like a good
way to kind of marry those two desires to do
something creative. But I don't want to do it where
it's really expensive either.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
So is you know with Derek, he your theme is
a cemetery, That's what you do the Van Ouk Cemetery.
Speaker 4 (03:14):
Correct.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
And when you started fourteen years ago on this particular
project where you're inspired by someone else's decorations at their
home for the holidays, for Halloween, and you said, you
know what, I'm an artist, I'm a designer.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
I want to do this for us.
Speaker 4 (03:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (03:33):
Weirdly enough, when I was in high school, there was
a haunt in Studio City called the Hallowed Haunting Grounds,
And many people who decorate for Halloween in and around
southern California will tell you that they kind of kicked
off the craze of people really going kind of overboard
with their Halloween decorations, and for me, I visited one
(03:55):
year and was kind of forever changed after that because
I hadn't ever considered the thought that I could decorate
in a way that wasn't just something I bought from
the store.
Speaker 2 (04:08):
Sure, which is fine in its own right, but if
you're a creative type, you want to Yeah, well.
Speaker 5 (04:13):
And there's something about being an individual and sort of
scratching a creative itch, and those are the types of
things that I'm constantly looking for. And when I finally
had a yard of my own to decorate, they were
the direct reference point for me because they did everything
that Disneyland did, but they did it out of their
(04:36):
garage essentially, and I just thought that was the coolest thing,
you know. But prior to that had never crossed my
mind that it was even possible.
Speaker 2 (04:46):
And so you start the first thing you said was, Okay,
the direction I'm going is a cemetery. Yes, So you
knew that much that that was what you're going to
start with in the front yard.
Speaker 3 (04:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (04:59):
It always to me like doing something like a cemetery
was something that could be added to year after year,
but was also something that would be good for people
of all ages. I know a lot of people are
into gore and extreme haunts and jump scares and things
(05:20):
like that, and there's room for that, but it's not
it's not something that's good for everybody. And yeah, that's
not my scene either. I want people to be you know,
to be spooky, sure, but I don't have like body
parts laying around my house or Yeah, and it's not
a slight to anyone who decorates in that way. It's
(05:41):
not my personal.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
Because there's an audience for it.
Speaker 5 (05:44):
Yeah, but I think about it in the way that, like,
you know, I decorate the house so that people in
the neighborhood can come and enjoy it. And we live
in a neighborhood with young children, or at least we did,
you know, they're they're all in high school or college now.
But I was decorating in part for them, sure, because
it should be accessible for everyone. You know, if you're
(06:06):
somebody like me who doesn't like being startled, there's got
to be a flavor for me too. And this was
more my speed, and so I just really went all
in on creating this.
Speaker 4 (06:19):
Very moody, spooky.
Speaker 5 (06:25):
Tableau essentially that allowed the visitor's minds to do all
of the heavy lifting. I will create the atmosphere and
then I will let you run wild with it. Is
that statue a real person? What is that sound I'm
hearing over there? Is the thunder and lightning? Real or manufactured?
(06:46):
Are any of these tombstones actually real tombstone? I mean,
you can kind of go down the list of things
that it could be in anyone's mind. But the beauty
of it is that my interpretation of it will be
different from yours, and yours from someone else's.
Speaker 3 (07:00):
You know, I love again.
Speaker 2 (07:02):
You can find out more at van Oaksprops dot com
vanosprops dot com. That'll, you know, that'll be your portal
to all of it, whether you go to is Etsy
stuff you see stuff that you want to purchase, whether
you want to maybe go and find out about the
silent auction that he's doing now for the things that
he's not going to need come November, uh after this
(07:26):
year here, so he's selling off a lot of these
props as well. But if you want to learn more,
go to van Oaks Props and you can find his
YouTube stuff and all of that. One of the things
that I love on your YouTube is that when you
revisit something all. I made this years ago, and I
know more now and I have better ideas of how
I want to change it. What was one prop one
(07:49):
part of the scene of your specific cemetery that you
change that you were like now that fits my vision more.
Speaker 5 (07:56):
I don't know that it was ever necessarily not fitting
the vision. It just wasn't completed to the degree that
I wanted or that my skills allowed for. Most recently,
just because it's top of mind, we have two very large,
fake brick columns with big lanterns on top that every
(08:19):
year someone will assume they are real and lean against them,
only to find that they will move.
Speaker 2 (08:24):
I've seen them in person. I would do that myself.
They're beautiful, and.
Speaker 5 (08:30):
You know, we've had them for quite a few years.
When my wife and I first made them, they looked
the part, but they were a bit too clean, And
I think part of my esthetic is more of a
really lived in older cemetery that's maybe not being tended to.
Speaker 2 (08:53):
You want to change the term lived in, I don't.
I don't know if it should be lived in if
it's just a yeah you want it to be to
have that the grunge factor even the one, the latest
one in this video is up today. It's only a
fourteen year old technically, so you had to you had
(09:16):
to weather it for that many years, and not the
one that was you know, in the seventeen eighteen hundreds
or something like that exactly.
Speaker 5 (09:24):
Which is funny because so much of the aesthetic that
I've tried to kind of create over the years is
very much that worn down and abandoned look, which is
funny because that is sort of like the intersection between
my love of Star Wars universe and how dirty and
grungey that all is. The used universe, absolutely, and it
(09:47):
carries over into Halloween, which is what I think about
the other half of the year.
Speaker 4 (09:51):
So it's it.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
Is funny though that you you know, when you even
see like Halloween, not Halloween, but Star Wars props, right,
the first thing, you know, helmets, I buy all those
things through. The first thing you do is go, this
looks too new. Yeah you're yeah exactly.
Speaker 5 (10:07):
And that was kind of what happened with these cemetery columns.
I just thought they would look more than what they
look right now. Plus you know, they're quite a few
years old and have spent a lot of time out
in the sun, and so the colors just aren't as
vibrant as they used to be. And I thought, what
better way to kind of breathe some new life into
(10:28):
it than to really go heavy and make them look
even older.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
And I love how this and I really want you
folks to check this out at van oaksprops dot com.
Is when you see these props we're talking about, and
how people ask me all the time, well, can I
just convert the front into some I said, yeah, you'd
be surprised how things like these pillars changed the whole
(10:53):
vibe of the front of a house and and those things.
And we'll talk more about that and where to put
your energies. Maybe something to start with if you're thinking,
you know, I want to do a little bit of
a haunt or a theme in the front yard this year.
I highly encourage it. It is worth it. I don't
care if five kids come by. It's still worth it
to see people get excited about it and you know,
(11:14):
just make their holiday a little bit. So go nowhere
talking with master prop maker Derek Young from van Os Props.
Speaker 3 (11:22):
So we'll come back with more.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
You're listening to the Fork Report with Neil Savedra on
demand from KFI AM six forty.
Speaker 2 (11:33):
Hey, happy Saturday to you. It is Halloween time and
you are here with the Fork Report. I'm Neil Savedra
and I'm just into the season. And Kayla just put
down in front of me. We haven't talked about this yet.
My guest is Derek Young. He is the owner, proprietor,
maker and creative mind behind van Oaks Props. You find
(11:57):
out more van Oaksprops dot. And we're talking about decorating
for Halloween your house and stuff if you're interested in
getting started and all of that. But his wife, Erin
is a masterful baker and always sends him with love.
And you can hear Kayla and the excitement of everybody
going on with that. So what is this such a
(12:20):
This is an apple cake.
Speaker 5 (12:22):
It is an apple cake. It is a Vermont classic
and it's like old school New England.
Speaker 3 (12:28):
Wow. Yeah that smells great. Oh that's good. Just a
little pinch. Yeah, Okay, yeah, I'm gonna I'm gonna murder
that in a second. But I just wanted that's so great.
Speaker 2 (12:41):
So we're talking with Derek Young from van Oaks Props
about decorating he started fourteen years ago as a graphic
designer and everything like that, using your gifts and abilities
to decorate. But you're moving, you're moving out of state,
and so this is the last one you're doing at
your current location home, and you're going to be selling off.
(13:03):
There's a silent auction. I put in one bid, but
it was I was in a hurry that I'm definitely
going to be bidding on some other things as well.
But you know, they're just so many beautiful pieces and
to you know, have a momento like that for my
yard would be fun to always think about that as well,
(13:24):
among other things. So somebody wants to start out, what
are the you know, top five tools for making tombstones?
Speaker 5 (13:35):
Well, I guess I have to give a qualifier. When
I make tombstones. My material of choice is pink insulation foam.
They also make it in other colors, but usually four
by six we'll find it in pink, and it comes
in four by eight sheets. Oh, four by eight, yeah,
and it's about fifty ish dollars. The price kind of
(13:56):
changes year to year. But it's a weird find that
other Halloween enthusiasts who've come before me figured out made
for a great material to make tombstones out of. That said,
if you choose to make your tombstones out of foam,
which I highly recommend, I would also suggest getting a
(14:18):
small pull saw because the blade on it is very small,
it cuts through this foam very easily. They're extremely inexpensive.
You can go to almost any hardware store and get
one off the shelf for under fifteen dollars. And then
outside of that, I would say get yourself a rotary tool,
(14:40):
like a dremal, something along those lines. And with the
a rotary tool and some pink foam, you can make
whatever shape of tombstone to whatever scale you want for
your display, and you can carve it with the rotary tool,
and then paint it using your standard sort of run
(15:01):
of the mill house paint, like exterior latex paint. If
you want to get fancy like me, I like using
a masonry seiler. The brand I see most often it's
called dry Lock, and it comes in a few different flavors.
I prefer the original style, and the reason that I
like it is because it has a gritty texture that,
(15:25):
once painted kind of lends itself to a very stone
like appearance.
Speaker 3 (15:29):
So there's like a sand or something in it.
Speaker 5 (15:31):
Yeah, And if you wanted sort of the cheat version
of this, you could take some exterior latex paint. Oftentimes
you will find various shades of gray in the oops
I bought the wrong colored department at your local hardware
store and get it for you know, half price, and
then go to the park or go to the garden
(15:54):
center and buy yourself some fine playground sand. And if
you add a bit of playground sand to this exterior
latex paint, you will essentially get a good mimic for
a masonry sailer that will have that same sort of
gritty texture at a fraction of the cost.
Speaker 3 (16:11):
I love it.
Speaker 2 (16:11):
And so you have done both relief style and then
I don't know what'd you call it in carving in style.
I mean I'm engraved. Yeah, engraved, that's the word I'm
looking for, Curry, That's what I was earlier in the show.
Speaker 4 (16:30):
It's like a glimpse into my own life.
Speaker 3 (16:32):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (16:35):
But I highly recommend you go to Van Oaksprops dot
com and check out the how realistic and these tombstones
have weight. And another buddy of mine who's a prop
maker goes, I'm digging this segment and I need some
tombstone tips. There is an art to weathering them afterwards,
(16:58):
and what is some of the props there to make
them look like they've been there?
Speaker 5 (17:03):
Sure, so there's a couple different ways you can go
about it. I've seen it done a few ways. There's
definitely one that is my favorite, which is to basically
mix a bunch of acrylic craft paints like black, brown,
green to create kind of a dirty water sort of look,
(17:23):
and then put it into a spray bottle and spray
it all over the tombstone, and naturally, because of how
water moves across surfaces, you will get a pretty good
approximation of what like organic natural weathering would happen to
a real tombstone in a real cemetery. If you didn't
have the time for that, or you wanted something that
(17:44):
was maybe a little less messy, you could just as
easily apply paint with a brush, thin it out with water,
and drag it downwards across the face of your tombstone
and use it to sort of accent parts of it
that you find most interesting, like if there's areas where
it would look like water might collect if you're doing
(18:04):
engraved lettering, look for those recesses and use that as
an opportunity to add more character to your tombstone.
Speaker 2 (18:12):
Any parting thoughts on people are on the fence about
putting something together in their yard this year that you
can give them.
Speaker 4 (18:21):
I would say, do it.
Speaker 5 (18:23):
You are bringing such enjoyment to people you don't even know,
and I think, given the way things are in the
world right now, we need every possible positive interaction that
we can muster, and I think decorating for Halloween is
one of those things that even if you don't hear
from people, you know that you have made an impact
(18:45):
in a positive way to people in your neighborhood.
Speaker 2 (18:48):
Just as someone slowing down as they drive by and
taking a look you're going, you know what, that's a memory.
And that's one of the reason why I do the show.
It's just something that people agree on. Good food and
good conversation, those things.
Speaker 3 (19:01):
This cake is so great.
Speaker 2 (19:06):
My first thought is I want a cup of coffee
with it on a cool fall morn and I'm like,
holy hell, God, bless Aaron. She is a national treasure
and we must protect her and her gifted hands at
all costs.
Speaker 4 (19:25):
I agree.
Speaker 2 (19:26):
Wow, holy smokes. Always good to see you, my friend.
I know this is your last year doing it here
in the valley. I know it's inspired other people. It
certainly inspired me. I first started doing tombstones back in
the late eighties, eighties, early nineties for haunts that we
(19:48):
did my younger brother and I and I look back
on that and I think, Wow, everything I wanted to
do and couldn't. Then I can see in what you
do and it's like, Okay, now I'm gonna I'm gonna
get up to speed and start doing these things again.
But that motivation and inspiration is a powerful, powerful tool,
(20:11):
So I appreciate all that you do. Again, Van Oaksprops
dot com. Van Oaks props dot com, check them out.
Go through the videos. Trust me, it is a rabbit hole.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
How many videos are there?
Speaker 4 (20:24):
Five years worth? Yeah, you can do the math every week.
Speaker 2 (20:27):
Carry the linears and he has over one hundred thousand
people following him on YouTube, which is a massive accomplishment.
Thanks so very cool. All right, buddy, Happy Halloween to you,
and we will talk again soon. It's the Fork Report.
Stick around. We'll talk carving pumpkins when we return with
our special guests. So go know where this is KFI
(20:47):
heard everywhere on the iHeartRadio app.
Speaker 3 (20:51):
You've been listening to the Forek Report.
Speaker 2 (20:53):
You can always hear us live on KFI AM six
forty two to five pm on Saturday, and anytime on
demand on the iHeartRadio app.
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