Hazard Decorating ideas

[Dynamic Equines]

I have been asked to help decorate a Round Bale Hazard for an event. There will be 18 total Rounds bales that will be set "up right". The bales are net wrapped so they have some thing to attach decorations to the sides. I am thinking I will only decorate 6 bales. I can put a pole in the top to put a flag. I can not paint the bales. Does any one have any great ideas for decorating the bales?

 

[Katie Iceton]

Stuffed animals, get them cheap at second hand stores, or use your childrens if they have outgrown them....cool patterend old sheets again thrift stores...cardboard cut outs....tons of things you can use!!! Pin old clothes on them too, make "people" with clothes....wrap one in some caution tape......or that bright pink construction tape.....wrap it in multiple colours!!!

I love decorating/designing/building hazards lol!!!!

 

[TMR]

Fake flowers can be stuck in the netwrap or get old bed sheets and paint the sheets and attach it to the netwrap that way your not painting the bale. Yellow sheets can make big happy faces pretty easily.

Donna

 

[Marsha Cassada]

I'm not exactly sure what you want to accomplish. If you are working on desenstizing, the colorful strings of plastic flags are good. You can order them from Oriental Trading or Flag and Banner.com

 

[hobbyhorse23]

I'm not exactly sure what you want to accomplish. If you are working on desenstizing, the colorful strings of plastic flags are good. You can order them from Oriental Trading or Flag and Banner.com

Marsha, obstacles at combined driving events are decorated. Usually each hazard has a theme ("Ghost Town", "Nuke Site" or "Fir Forest" for instance) and a sponsor or volunteer may decorate accordingly. It looks better in pictures, gives the spectators something to admire and proves the mettle of the horses!

Dynamic, people often do put country flags on the top to represent where competitors are from, or you could put one main pole up from the center bale and use streamers (at a safe height, of course!) to make a may pole with the other bales. You could use a carousel theme, or patriotic, or holiday, or make a pun out of it and then illustrate that pun. What part of the country is the event being held in, what time of year, and is there a theme already? Is your hazard (sorry, obstacle

) named or do you get to do that? Give us something to work with here!

There's always making it a giant checkerboard or whack-a-mole game....

Leia

 

[paintponylvr]

Using a bed sheet for painting - paint a big OLE' Target... then put that saying - "Bang head here" with arrow pointing to the bullseye... LOLOLOL!!!!

I'm not very good at decorating but I've always wanted to see that one and see how drivers responded to it.

 

[Dynamic Equines]

I decided to decorate the round bales to resemble Easter Baskets.

I took Safe Choice ( Plastic Feed Sacks) and cut out various designs. One basket will be covered with polka dots, one with bunnies, one with diamond shapes. I spray painted the shapes and attached them to the bales with pipe cleaners. I covered another bale with colored duct tape for stripes. I used two pool noodles to make the handle of the basket. On top of the baskets. I am using differnt items for the items inside the basket. I bought pin wheel flowers, stuffed animals and huge eggs. Now I just hope the event does not get rained out. We have had a horrible drought now we are getting rain every other day it seems- We are not complaining we needed the rain.

 

[hobbyhorse23]

That's awesome!!! Love that idea.

Leia

 

[Marsha Cassada]

That sounds like a fantastic decorating idea! I hope you will show pictures for those of us who are not familiar with the set up.

 

[Dynamic Equines]

The event was fun but it was a muddy mess. We have been in a year long drought until this month. We got 3 inches of rain the night before the event. My pictures did not come out very good.

I decorated 3 bales with Easter themed stuff. I tried to make each bale look like an Easter basket. I took 2 pool noodles for each bale and made basket handles.

I wrapped one bale in colored duct tape to resemble stripes. (This was my favorite it was easy to do and it stood out)

One bale I took plastic feed sacks and cut out big polka dots. I sprayed the dots with Easter colored spray paints. I used pipe cleaners to affix the dots all around the bales to the net.

Another bale I cut out rabbit shapes from the same plastic feed sacks. I painted on eyes and noses. I then used Pipe cleaners to make whiskers. I also used pipe cleaners to attach the rabbits.

I wrapped each bale around the top and bottom with some cheap pastel colored fabric strip. I got the fabric from a local resale shop.

The hazard turned out really cute. It was just a muddy mess at the end.

Thanks for your ideas.