Haunting Your Yard!

Well, alright, it’s not haunted in that ghosts and goblins are rattling chains or moving things as we make our way through the shop. Rather, it’s soon to be our new building space dedicated to working on the ensuing props & decorations for this upcoming Halloween. Therefore, it’s going to be our “haunted” shop, soon!

We’re very fortunate in that we just wrapped up a business whereby we had to store a number of cars and needed a place to “detail” cars. Since we’ve sold most of the assets and are just keeping a few of the “toys”, reads Lotus Elise and Old Jeep, we’re using the rest of the space for our decorating projects.

Having this luxury is awesome! However, we’ve spent the past 5 years or so building our elaborate decorations inside our homes 2 car garage. As Jodi posted several days ago, we’re slowly getting ready. Having any space to build props whether it’s a garage or inside an extra room or even the basement is helpful for any Halloween haunt. Your needs will grow as the size of props and projects grow, ours have. Now, we’re on to bigger and better ideas that will nearly take over our home this years. I’m sure in a few years we’ll need twice this space as we let it get out of control, and we do, get out of control, but in a good way.

First things first, moving all of the tools and stuff from our garage is the first logical step in getting organized this year. Next will be building counters and spaces to do more tombstone work and organizing the tools. The goal is to have it in place in the next few weekends so we can start laying out our October plans and getting started sooner rather than later.

Space to grow and test ideas in secret is awesome!!!

If you’re as fortunate as us, there’s a company over in Boulder called The Resource Yard that specializes in recycled building materials. We’ve popped over there many times over the years to rummage through their inventory. Initially it was a bit disorganized and we haven’t been over there in a few years. So, this past Saturday, the 24th, we stopped by and WOW, they’re really getting organized.

After poking through the cabinets and doors section, we stumbled upon several shelves of iron work stuff that was still in the wrapping. There was tons of this stuff. It’s a good thing we went in our mid-size SUV or we’d have bought the lot. It was $5 per piece or $20 for 5 pieces. We bought the set of 5 with plans to add an arch to the main entrance to our cemetery and add another smaller archway along the fencing somewhere, like a side entrance. If it goes well, we’ll probably go back for more.

We also found all kinds of other fun stuff. They had a plethora of shutters, doors, windows and other such building stuff for $20 bucks or less. Plus, there’s a lot of old beams, wood, cabinets, roofing, tiles, light fixtures and all kinds of great finds for making an old haunted house.

Check your local city, county or state for recycling centers near you. You may be surprised to discover a building materials recyclers or some other great recycle center that has all kinds of great things for haunting your yard. If you locate something, share by posting in our comments section.

These iron pieces are a great find!

So we are slowly making the transition from working and building in our garage to moving everything to our storage condo.  We are setting up a space there dedicated to Halloween props.  Which is exciting!  For one thing, we don’t have to continually keep putting everything up, or as what usually happens when we get close to Halloween - lose our garage and have to keep both cars parked outside.

The other great thing is what we work on will be kept secret - the neighborhood kids won’t be able to ask what we are doing this year!

We have decided to do our first walk through.  Part of it will be going through our house and out into the garage.   We plan to have friends help us keep the number of people coming through under control and we plan on building a couple of fake walls to keep the rest of the house from being visible.  As we start constructing those we’ll take pictures and post the progress.

So I’m eager to get going.  One of the things on our to-do list, besides adding some new tombstones, will be to construct a very real looking coffin, or as we like to call them in the Halloween world - toe pincher.

Stay tuned as we will start posting tutorials as we get started!

I would like to say right off the bat, that I realize some of the things we incorporate into our voodoo room are not voodoo  and this year we will most likely be adding more.  But the overall feel we are going for is that voodoo feel - like what was in Pirates of the Caribbean.

This year, instead of setting up in the bathroom down in the basement, we will be setting up in our garage so that trick-or-treaters will be able to view it.  The past two years we have done it, it has been one of my favorite things we do, but has only been “enjoyed” by our Halloween party guests.  This year that will change.

I am a firm believer that gore is not needed to create a scare.  Not that well placed body parts and such aren’t effective - we have done it before and will most likely do it again this year in some capacity - but the element of the “unknown” can be just as creepy.  We also get a lot of very small children and so we are careful about what we do.

I think we are planning our first walk-through this year, and the voodoo room will be part of it.  The opportunities that can open up to us by moving it out of the bathroom and into the garage are endless.  For now, I’ll describe how we set up in the bathroom.  As the months progress and we start planning out the garage, I’ll add to this.

One thing we did was put a pentagram on the floor.  This was something that freaked people out a bit.  Dylan took great pains in trying to get it right - his advanced math skills came in handy!  I would really like to add more detail this year.

I also did some research regarding symbols.  I printed them out, tore the edges of the paper up and soaked the paper in coffee.  This gave them an older look.  We also drew symbols on mirrors.  I created a spell book - with some authentic spells and I even included the ingredients on the table, so that if anyone got adventurous enough….

The jars were quite a find - they were given to me.  I had made a request on freecycle and someone responded.

Of course you need bones and skulls lying about.  Lots and lots of candles too.  Don’t forget the shrunken heads.  Year one I made them out of apples - this past year I bought them.

This last year we also dressed up our animated butler and turned him into a bit of a voodoo witch.  This next year I will have a live person doing the honors.  I have a particular friend in mind!  The butler will have other responsibilities in another part of the walk-through.

Last but not least, the one element that creates the whole mood is the music.  I was lucky enough to find some that is actual voodoo drums playing.  The music is a must.  For me it was a good sign when some guests would not step over the threshold of the room.  Hopefully this year we can bring it up to the next level.