Haunted Eve's Halloween Blog

Audi Vampire Commercial

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 17:57:00 +0000

2011 Yard Haunt Pics

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Tue, 01 Nov 2011 17:32:00 +0000

The complete set of pictures from this year's Halloween yard haunt are up on our website: http://www.hauntedeve.com/Haunted2011.htm
The theme for this year was "The Grim Reaper".

Happy Halloween!

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 19:41:00 +0000

Happy Halloween! It's been a busy couple of days. Saturday we cleaned and carved pumpkins. Set up the display yesterday afternoon and then took photos last night and tweaked a few things today. Getting a better handle on how to go about decorating the new place. Going to be cold tonight, but it's dry for a change. Actually will be able to run the fog machine tonight for a change! Hoping for a lot of trick-or-treaters tonight. Here's a teaser pic of tonight's Halloween display.

Canandaigua Pumpkin Walk 2011

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Thu, 27 Oct 2011 02:53:00 +0000

This was our second year attending the Ontario Pathways Pumpkin Walk in Canandaigua. There's something magical about walking along a dark wooded trail lined with hundreds of jack-o'-lanterns. There were so many great carvings. We took pictures of some of our favorites which can be seen on our Haunted Eve website: http://www.hauntedeve.com/Pumpkinwalk2011.htm

Halloween Window

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 21:03:00 +0000

A Pumpkin Carving Master

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Sat, 08 Oct 2011 19:27:00 +0000

http://villafanestudios.com/

We have been watching Food Network's Challenge: Outrageous Pumpkins 2 and Halloween Wars and are just blown away by the pumpkin carvings of artist Ray Villafane. Check out his amazing sculptures at http://villafanestudios.com/

Halloween 2011: Grim Reaper Theme

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 15:57:00 +0000

This year's theme will be all about the Grim Reaper. So expect to see old Grim and his nefarious cloaked cohorts abound for the 2011 yard haunt! We're going to try to work more with the new house's layout and structure this time around. Last year we tried to force the old haunt layout on the new space and weren't thrilled with the results. We've added some new props and will be tweaking some old ones and hope to get some awesome photos this Halloween!

New Prop Ordered!

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 20:30:00 +0000

A new prop for this year's yard haunt.

Animated Gatekeeper from Spirithalloween.com

Halloween 2011 Just Around The Corner

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Thu, 08 Sep 2011 22:03:00 +0000

Only 52 days until Halloween and so far we've done zilch regarding preparations this year. Uh-oh! We'll be sitting down and working out what we want to do with this year's haunt regarding props and decorations soon! Got to come up with some fresh ideas and get some stuff ordered! There are a few new items out there that have caught our eye: http://www.grandinroad.com/halloween-haven/
The attempt at growing some giant pumpkins this year wasn't all that impressive. Out of approximately 6 vines, we have one usable pumpkin that is currently slightly bigger than a basketball. Having a lot of landscape work at our new place this summer meant that we didn't have the time to do much more than throw some seeds into our left over tree planting dirt pile and water the vines that grew. Next year we'll put some more effort into growing them.

Pumpkin Seeds For 2011

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Mon, 04 Apr 2011 18:48:00 +0000

Going to take a stab at growing our own pumpkins for Halloween this year and decided to try the Big Moon, Big Max, and Red Warty Thing varieties. We want some really big pumpkins this year, so we hope the Big Moon or the Big Max do the trick without us having to invest in buying a crane or forklift. After starting the seedlings at the beginning of May, we'll move them outdoors to two 4' x 8' raised planting beds with the goal of keeping the vines restricted to within the beds. We do not expect them to reach their full potential due to the restrictions of the planting beds, but hope with plenty of fertilizer and water they will be substantial in size, e.g. 50 - 60 pound range. The Red Warty Thing variety do not get all that big but just look really cool! Should be a lot of fun.

Rotting Pumpkins

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Tue, 22 Feb 2011 19:39:00 +0000

We didn't get around to taking any pumpkin portraits after this past Halloween like we traditionally do. The weather just didn't cooperate. We only managed to get a few shots just before they went into the compost pile. We think for 2011 we will plant and grow our own giant pumpkins and we will focus more on carving giant jack-o'-lanterns for displaying on Halloween night.

Halloween 2010 Yard Haunt Pics Are Up!

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 21:34:00 +0000

The 2010 yard haunt pics are now up on the Haunted Eve web site: http://www.hauntedeve.com/Haunted2010.htm
This year's theme was spider based. Because of the house move this year, we were not able to go as full-out as we have in the past few years. We did manage to add a few new props and items, but primarily recycled items that we had from previous haunts with a few tweaks. Enjoy!

Halloween 2010 - Cold, Wet, and Snowy

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Tue, 02 Nov 2010 00:25:00 +0000

How quickly Halloween comes and goes! We had a very successful Halloween 2010 yard haunt at the new house despite the inclement weather. The evening brought rain, sleet, and snow. The evening was nasty, yet we still managed to get 79 trick-or-treaters. Pictures from this year's haunt should be posted on the Haunted Eve web site within the next day or two.

Cemetery Pedestal

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Mon, 25 Oct 2010 21:09:00 +0000

I built a cemetery pedestal for displaying our newly acquired gargoyle in the yard haunt. After having wind related tip over issues with the cemetery gate posts I constructed for last Halloween, I deliberately made the pedestal short and stocky. I also decided to make it a dual purpose prop by leaving the back partially open with a shelf for hiding a fog machine or other special effect device.

Halloween 2010 Yard Haunt Sneak Peek

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Fri, 22 Oct 2010 16:50:00 +0000

Here is a sneak peak at this year's yard haunt. The concept was designed by Mrs. Haunted Eve and I sketched it out in this storyboard. I find storyboarding a helpful tool for determining the overall yard haunt layout and prop placement, especially when considering that this is our first time yard haunting at the new home.

"Scare" Crows

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Wed, 20 Oct 2010 14:58:00 +0000

Our favorite from the Fairport Scarecrow Festival.

Shopping Mall Scarecrows

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Wed, 20 Oct 2010 14:35:00 +0000

Canandaigua Pumpkin Walk 2010

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Sun, 17 Oct 2010 16:07:00 +0000

Last night we took a moonlight stroll along a mile long wooded path lined with 100's of jack-o'-lanterns. It was a chilly night but well worth enduring the cold night's air. We saw many excellent carvings and loved the use of wooden stepladders and wedging pumpkins between tree trunks as display techniques.

Another Local Neighborhood Yard Haunt

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 15:29:00 +0000

Here are a few pictures from another local neighborhood yard haunt in our town. The people at this house have been decorating their yard every October for as long as we can remember. They always do a nice job and it's always a little bit different each year. Their real forte is Christmas decorations; their house and yard at Christmas time are a site to behold.

Halloween Mall Display

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 15:06:00 +0000

Pictures from a Halloween display taken at Eastern Hills Mall - Williamsville, NY this past October. It was nice to see a shopping mall decorate for Halloween for a change! It's bad enough many stores started putting up Christmas items and pulling Halloween decorations by mid October.

Rocking Bat

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 04:34:00 +0000

In last year's haunt we added to the haunted shack a sound activated dropping spider that would slowly crawl back up its web. The spider was a big hit with the kids. So when we saw a sound activated rocking bat in a Halloween specialty store we just had to get it for this year's haunt. Once again, the interactive prop was enjoyed by the younger kids. I had intended to make a small video of the bat in action, but because of all the problems we had due to wind and rain on Halloween, I totally forgot to do it. Luckily my wife unintentionally captured it moving in a series of pictures she took. The bat's eyes would light up red and it made really creepy sounds. The bat also had blue LED's mounted in the top of the unit that would highlight the bat's rocking body when activated.

Halloween 2009 Yard Haunt Pics Posted

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 18:17:00 +0000

The 2009 yard haunt pictures are now posted on our main website: http://www.hauntedeve.com/Haunted2009.htm

The Halloween From Hell

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 15:35:00 +0000

Hope everyone else had a better Halloween than we did! Where to start? Was it the 10+ hours of setup during intermittent showers on Friday? Having to install drain holes in the bottom of our jack-o'-lanterns instead of vents in the lids due to the forecast of overnight and morning rain showers? Was it because the wind started kicking up Friday night and whisked away all the fog from the fog machine within a matter of seconds while we were trying to take pictures? Was it waking up to a steady rain and not "showers" on Halloween morning? Was it the sustained winds of 40 mph with gusts over 58 mph all day and into the early evening on Halloween that broke most of our cheaper foam headstones, kept extinguishing our jack-o'-lanterns, and kept turning our giant vampire bat so that it was facing the house instead of out? Or was it the fact that after 24 hours of zero problems with the cemetery fence and newly built entrance gate that at 5:00 PM on Halloween we discover the entrance gate had toppled over breaking the iron-look gate, the gargoyle toppers, and a green flood light, and almost took out the rest of the cemetery fence with a domino effect? Or was it the fact the temperatures quickly dropped from the high 50's to low 40's as the sun set and the front pushed through and dumped more rain on us just after we fixed the entrance gate?

Of course by very late evening the skies cleared, the moon and stars came out, the winds turned to a gentle breeze, and we woke to sunshine this morning. After 12 years of either great or manageable weather for Halloween it was inevitable to eventually get a day like yesterday. Needless to say we quickly remedied all the problems to the best of our ability and "made it work". Most of our ~80 trick-or-treaters all came between the hours of 6:30 and 7:30 PM and it was pretty much over by 8:00 PM which was somewhat anti-climatic for all the hours of preparation and work that went into this year's yard haunt. We did manage to get lots of really great pictures. Now we need to clean up the mess in the yard and do pumpkin portraits this evening. We should have pictures up on the website later this week.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 15:45:00 +0000

Modified picture of a store front window taken
in Salem, MA from 2003

We'll be pretty busy over the next few days carving pumpkins and setting up the yard haunt for Saturday. Weather might not be very cooperative but we will persevere. Hopefully we'll have some very good pictures up on the website by the end of next week.
Have a fun, safe, and spooky Halloween!

Only A Week To Go

noreply@blogger.com (Haunted Eve) — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 15:23:00 +0000

Only a week to go before the big day. We're in pretty good shape for this year's Halloween yard haunt. We acquired 20 pumpkins total from 3 different local roadside farm stands and were quite happy with the selection. The pumpkins have been cleaned up and await their Halloween transformation. All the major prop builds have been completed and most of the decorations have been pulled out of storage and are ready to be put on display. Just a few last minute details like getting new batteries for anything that needs them and the arrival of a last minute prop item order (we deemed earlier this week that the monster hands from the 2005 green eyed demon prop were not the correct scale for this year's new Nosferatu prop and did not meet our quality standards for our display). We will hopefully have yard haunt pictures up on our main www.hauntedeve.com website by the end of the first week in November.