I would like to think that I am the not the only one that goes a bit overboard when it comes to decorating the house for Halloween. Please post your pictures and your stories from Halloween of 2009.
We have been working on our set up for about 5 years now. We try to add something new each year but we are rapidly running out of room. The new additions for this year were a projection of the Cadaver Dan's singing Grim Grinning Ghosts on the fence and an inflatable animated black cat. The weather was pretty good. Ideal for the fog machines and inflatables is warm temperatures and no wind. We got the warm temperatures but the wind kicked up a little so the fog did not stick all that well. We go with a sort of not so scary theme as we do not want to traumatize the kids. Even wit the incredibly mild and cheerful set up we still have kids and adults that are too scared to walk through our inflatable haunted house.
Set up is a pretty intense day. All of this stuff has to go up and come down in one day. Thanks to Halloween being on a Saturday this year we had an extra day to break down. I also did all of the wiring (about 1000' worth of extension chords) the weekend before. The biggest challenge has always been the 14' tall inflatable haunted house. Normally I would weight down the ground connection points with 10-15 lb 16" square pieces of beam material but this year I tried something a bit more extreme. This year I decided to commit and drill holes in the drive way and attach it with Tapcon masonry screws. It was hands down one of the best decisions I have ever made. With the old weights I was constantly adjusting the house as the night went on. With the screws I did not have to touch the thing.
We did have one casualty this year. Out 6 foot anamatronic skeleton pirate took a tumble about 3 PM and broke his arm and scrambled the electronics. He will be in surgery this weekend.
We turned the candy up a notch this year and went with full size candy bars (Snickers, Snickers Almond, 3 Musketeers, Milky Way and Twix) with a few other things mixed into a treat bag. I also added a KK business card in each bag so not only can I write off the candy as a promotional expense but I might get a client or two out of the deal as well. We had prepared for 150 kids. I thought that would be more than enough but my wife thought we would need more. As usual my wife was right. Fortunately we had a private stash that we used as a back up. By the end of the night we had just short of 200 kids.
All in all it turned out to be a great Halloween and I already know what the addition will be next year. Over the course of the year I will be recreating the tomb stones from HM. Looks like I gt to learn how to carve Styrofoam over the next 12 months.
Here are a few day time pictures.
The view through the ceiling of your haunted house.
Fog chillers are all iced up and ready to go.
We have been working on our set up for about 5 years now. We try to add something new each year but we are rapidly running out of room. The new additions for this year were a projection of the Cadaver Dan's singing Grim Grinning Ghosts on the fence and an inflatable animated black cat. The weather was pretty good. Ideal for the fog machines and inflatables is warm temperatures and no wind. We got the warm temperatures but the wind kicked up a little so the fog did not stick all that well. We go with a sort of not so scary theme as we do not want to traumatize the kids. Even wit the incredibly mild and cheerful set up we still have kids and adults that are too scared to walk through our inflatable haunted house.
Set up is a pretty intense day. All of this stuff has to go up and come down in one day. Thanks to Halloween being on a Saturday this year we had an extra day to break down. I also did all of the wiring (about 1000' worth of extension chords) the weekend before. The biggest challenge has always been the 14' tall inflatable haunted house. Normally I would weight down the ground connection points with 10-15 lb 16" square pieces of beam material but this year I tried something a bit more extreme. This year I decided to commit and drill holes in the drive way and attach it with Tapcon masonry screws. It was hands down one of the best decisions I have ever made. With the old weights I was constantly adjusting the house as the night went on. With the screws I did not have to touch the thing.
We did have one casualty this year. Out 6 foot anamatronic skeleton pirate took a tumble about 3 PM and broke his arm and scrambled the electronics. He will be in surgery this weekend.
We turned the candy up a notch this year and went with full size candy bars (Snickers, Snickers Almond, 3 Musketeers, Milky Way and Twix) with a few other things mixed into a treat bag. I also added a KK business card in each bag so not only can I write off the candy as a promotional expense but I might get a client or two out of the deal as well. We had prepared for 150 kids. I thought that would be more than enough but my wife thought we would need more. As usual my wife was right. Fortunately we had a private stash that we used as a back up. By the end of the night we had just short of 200 kids.
All in all it turned out to be a great Halloween and I already know what the addition will be next year. Over the course of the year I will be recreating the tomb stones from HM. Looks like I gt to learn how to carve Styrofoam over the next 12 months.
Here are a few day time pictures.
The view through the ceiling of your haunted house.
Fog chillers are all iced up and ready to go.
