Halloween Stories to Liven Up Your Halloween Party

One of the best activities to really bring out the spooky at a Halloween party if for everyone to sit around a candlelit room and tell their own scary Halloween stories, especially if these are true stories.
Most people have a scary Halloween experience that they like to tell, or a ghost story they wouldn’t mind sharing, and what better time to do this than at a Halloween party. If you and your guests don’t have enough Halloween or ghost stories to keep everyone entertained, you can always related some of the Halloween urban legends that have been making the rounds for years, such as the hanging dummy in the Halloween attraction that was a real dead person, or maybe even a real story, such as when the lady that was hanging from her tree for days, but since it was Halloween everyone thought it was just another Halloween prop.
With a little imagination you can turn any Halloween party into a true spooky event with scary Halloween stories.

Halloween Cooking

Halloween cooking has always been a tradition in our family. We always cook up special Halloween dishes and treats for this holiday. The main course has always been to cook up a big pan of chili, and some breadsticks that my mother always called skeleton bones. Then of course the candy apples, spiced cider etc.
Here is a recipe for your own homemade Halloween chili and skeleton bones.

Halloween Chili
2 tablespoons oil
4 pounds ground beef
4 cups chopped onions
3 tablespoons chili powder
1 tablespoon cumin
2 teaspoons cayenne pepper
3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon crushed red peppers
1 bay leaf
2 tablespoons minced garlic
4 bottles dark beer
2 cans whole tomatoes, crushed
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 tablespoon salt
1 tablespoon brown sugar
6 cups cooked red kidney beans or 4 cans, drained and rinsed
1 cup grated Cheddar cheese
1 cup finely chopped green onions
1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro leaves

Heat the oil in a large heavy pot over high heat. Add the beef and brown well, about 10 minutes. Add the onions, chili powder, cumin, cayenne, cinnamon, crushed red pepper flakes, and bay leaf and cook, stirring often, until the onions soften, about 8 minutes. Add the garlic and cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Add the beer and cook until the foam subsides, about 1 minute. Add the tomatoes, tomato paste, salt, and brown sugar to the pot. Stir well and bring to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and cook until slightly thickened, about 1 hour, stirring occasionally to prevent the chili from sticking to the bottom of the pot. Skim off as much fat as possible. Add the beans, return to a simmer, cover, and cook until thickened, about 1 1/2 hours longer. Serve with the cheese, green onions, and cilantro alongside as garnish.

Halloween: Skeleton Bones Bread
1/2 pk Frozen bread dough
1 tb Water
1 Egg, beaten
1 tb Poppy seeds

Instructions for Halloween: Skeleton Bones Bread
Thaw and let bread rise according to manufacturers instructions. Punch down dough; divide in half. Set 1 half aside. Cut remaining half into thirds. With 1 of the thirds, form head shaped like a light bulb. With scissors, cut eyes, nose and mouth. Place heat at end of greased 17x11-inch rimmed baking sheet. Shape second third into 3-inch long triangle; place, point down, below heat to form body. Divide remaining third of dough into 7 pieces; roll into sausages. Arrange 3 on each side of upper body for ribs. Use remaining piece for neck. Halve reserved dough. With 1 half, make 4 logs for upper and lower legs; attach to body. With two-thirds of the remaining dough, make 4 logs for upper and lower arms; attach at shoulders. With remaining dough, make 2 small and 2 large triangles for hands and feet. With scissors, make 4 cuts at broad ends of triangles for fingers and toes; attach to arms and legs. Cover and let rise for 30 minutes. Whisk egg with water; brush some over joints, pressing to seal. Brush entire skeleton with remaining egg wash; sprinkle with poppy seeds. Bake in 375F oven for about 15 minutes or until golden.

Making a Halloween Prop Corpse

Here is some information about how to make your own Halloween Prop Corpse for your home haunt.

Make Gargoyle From Halloween Skeleton Prop

To make this gargoyle I bought a Halloween skeleton prop and put the flesh on it by mixing a mixture of monster mud, and glue with strips of cotton from cotton balls. After applying it in different locations around the skeleton, I let it dry. I also attached some horns that I had made, to the head, and used wire and sheer cloth to make wings, which I attached to the back.
After you have added several layers of flesh to the skeleton, and it has completely dried, you then stain it with wood stain. I used dark cherry wood stain. When this has dried you then spray the gargoyle with a clear coat finish to give it the glossy flesh look. Though in this picture the gargoyle is not hung up, this Halloween prop works great posed on top of a building or hanging from a tree.

Scary Halloween Music, Sound Effects

The sound effects you use for your Halloween home haunt will be just as important as the lighting effects. Sound sets atmosphere and you will want to have your sound effects and scary Halloween music to match your home haunt.
Unless you have a sophisticated computer sound setup, you will probably want to use little battery operated stereos in the different locations that you need sound. Hide the stereo in a strategic location, such as beneath a table that is covered with a cloth, behind a large prop, etc.
You can either buy the sound effects that you need or make your own. Each area will have different types of sound that will be needed. For example, in the cemetery you will want tolling funeral bells, moaning ghosts, etc. In your alien room you’ll want blips, beeps and high technology type sounds.
I usually have a parlor where the guests enter; here I have some scary organ music playing, and one year we made a cave with bats, here we had footsteps, the sound of dripping water, bats, and screams.

How To Make Your Own Tombstone Halloween Props

If you want to really dress up your home for Halloween, you need a graveyard, and every graveyard needs lots of Tombstones. Here is how you can make those Halloween Prop Tombstones yourself.

Halloween Props: Alien Autopsy Room

In one of our home haunt rooms we usually make an alien autopsy room. To begin with I create a frame for the Alien prop, and dress is with a costume. The walls of the room can be left as they are, or you can dress up the walls with sheets of tinfoil that cover the entire surface of the wall.
Lighting effects in the alien autopsy room can include colored lights, as well as a strobe light.

You will need a long folding table for the autopsy table, as well as a body or corpse prop to place on it. For this prop I simply stuffed some clothes with a little newspaper, added some foam insulation in some areas and let it dry, then painted it. You can use a foam head, and mask for the head, cover with a white cloth or sheet in the areas that you don’t want seen.
You’ll want some extra props, such as body parts and blood. This same setup can work for any type of Halloween autopsy room; just replace the alien with a mad scientist or mortician. It is also a good idea to replace the prop with an actor in costume.

Grave Crawler Halloween Prop

Here is a video of a homemade Halloween prop. The animated singing grave crawler would make a great addition to a home haunt.




Another nice prop for the graveyard

Stay Safe Halloween Lighting

Last year there was a major launch of a line of battery operated Halloween lighting products. With fire being such a threat on Halloween this is a great alternative to candles. Home haunters may find some good uses for this type of lighting as fire hazard are a special concern for home haunters.



Some Halloween lighting products

Making the Halloween Life Size Prop

This is a great ready made Halloween Prop





For a Halloween home haunt or yard haunt, you will probably want some life size props to bring some realism to your sets. I have found that making the life size props, monsters etc, to one of the most difficult aspects of created your own home haunt, but if you start early, and take your time, you can make some really spooky Halloween life size props.

To begin with you need some PCV pipe that are about ½ or ¾ inches in diameter. Cut the pipe with a pipe cutter after measuring how long you want the torso, legs, arms, neck, and how wide the shoulders will be. You fit these pipes together using couplings, and T connections, once you’ve put them together and they fit correctly and in proportion you will need to glue them with PVC glue.
The stand is also made with pipe and fittings. I make mine by attaching the frame to a wide cross-section, which is attached to a square stand, all made from PCV pipe and fittings.
After you have completed the frame you will need to wrap the torso and other body parts with chicken wire and shape them. You may also choose to use foam but this tends to make the prop heaver. Attach a foam head to the neck.
From this point you dress up your prop with whatever costume you have chosen, using the clothes and latex mask. Some people choose to use monster mud on the foam head and hands to create their props, but this can be time consuming and difficult. Most often I use a latex mask and hands to finish the life size Halloween prop.

Vampire Bat Halloween Prop

Here is a really awesome pneumatically controlled vampire bat Halloween Prop used in a home yard haunt.

Halloween Costume and Game Ideas

Every Halloween parents face the same dilemma, buying costumes for kids and finding fun activities for them to celebrate Halloween.

Halloween Adult Fun

What is so great about the adult Halloween party is that you can really let your imagination go wild. Add lots of scary and gory Halloween props, and some scary music and games, and you have some good Halloween adult fun.
Some adult party games include the serial killer hide and seek game, where everyone hides in the dark, and the person who is it seeks out and pretends to get the people that are hiding, but if you really want to make it a spooky event, there’s always the talking board.
Though you should be warned that there is some controversy about how safe this is, and that it may actually cause some problems with the paranormal during its use, or after. People use the talking board or Quja Board to communicate with the dead and other disembodied spirits; it is suppose to work well on Halloween night when the veil between this world and the next, is thinnest.
Creating your own neighborhood home haunt can also be a party in itself. Get lots of friends together and put on your own haunted attraction for the neighborhood. This is a lot of fun if you really get into decorating for Halloween.

The Halloween Home Haunts: Your Spooks Should be in Costume and Character

No matter how many cool Halloween props you have in your haunted house, it will not come alive unless you have actors in costumes. When you have people dressed in costumes that go with the theme of the rooms, or scenes within your haunted house; not only does it bring an extra spook element to your haunt, but actors can do many things that you can’t do, even with animated props.
Dressing your actors, or helpers in Halloween costumes is essential for any haunted house, but when they are in costume, they will also have stay in character. This isn’t as important for the home haunter as it is for the pro haunted house, but if you really want to pull of a really great haunted house, the people helping you should try to stick to these rules.
A mummy eating a caramel apple, and giggling with their friends, isn’t going to scare too many people.
I know this is one of the hardest parts about pulling off a good home haunt. Every year this seems to be a problem, as some people don’t want to stay in the rooms they were assigned, or be talking on their cell phones while they are suppose to be scaring the group that is coming through.
I still haven’t been able to completely solve this problem, as you can’t be too choosy who helps with your home haunt when you need all the help you can get. One idea would be to assign those people different tasks. If there are some people helping you that you are fairly sure won’t get into the acting aspect of the project, assign them some other task, maybe putting together the graveyard.
Others that you are pretty sure will be able to stay in character, and keep their costumes on, at least most of the time, go ahead and assign them a place within your haunt. Ensure everyone has a Halloween costume to match the character they will play, and know what they are suppose to be doing on that night.
Remember, you are essentially putting on a miniature live production.

The Rocky Point Haunted House

For my first post about Halloween Haunted Houses, I wanted to pay tribute to The Rocky Point Haunted House, which was the premier haunted attraction in the country up until Rocky Point closed its doors for the last time, following the 2006 Halloween Season.
The Rocky Point Haunted house first came into existence in my hometown. I grew up in the same area as Cydney Neil and her brother; the creators of this famous haunted attraction.
I have to admit, I received a lot of my inspiration by some of their efforts. When the Rocky Point Haunted house first came into existence in 1979, Neil Crabtree had it housed in his family’s old restaurant, which sat on a high hill, above Highway 89. It was a round building, and was very unique. The building that housed the Rocky Point Haunted House burned a couple of different times, the last time was October 23, 1996, and this time the building burned to the ground. Mysteriously, the cause of the fire was never discovered.
At this point, Rocky Point Haunted house moved to the Salt Lake area and went on to become one of the most prominent haunted attractions in the industry. This was an immense haunted house, with more than one attraction. The care put into their props was legendary in the haunt industry, and in fact, were Hollywood quality props.
For nearly 30 years, the Halloween Season was as much about the Rocky Point Haunted House, as it was about trick or treat, and pumpkins. Entire generations grew up with Rocky Point, and the artful haunting of this haunted attraction will be missed for a long time to come.

Ideas For Halloween Party Games

If you plan on throwing a party for Halloween, aside from Halloween decorations, and your menu, you’ll also want some Halloween party games to help entertain your guests. The types of games you have at your party will depend on the age group of your guests. Obviously the games you have for an adult party wouldn’t be appropriate for a children’s Halloween party.
To keep the little ghosts and goblins entertained at your next children’s Halloween party, you can try one of these games.
The Halloween Balloon Fight. To play this game you will need enough orange and black balloons so that each player has one. All the children are divided into two teams, with each team having either all black, or all orange balloons. The balloons are tied onto the ankle of each player. The object of the game is for players to try and pop all the balloons of the other team. The first team with all their balloons popped, loses.
Halloween Musical Tombstones: This game is played much the same as musical chairs, except that you use Halloween music, and slip a paper grocery sack over the back of the chairs; using a marker to write R.I.P, and an epitaph. And don’t forget to draw some spooky pictures on them too.
For older kids, or adults, one of the favorite activities for Halloween is telling scary stories. Have everyone sit in a dark room, lit only with carved pumpkins, or flickering lights. Have each person tell a scary story; it can be something made up, or something that really happened to them.
Killer Instinct: This version of Hide and Seek puts a chilling Halloween twist on an old game. The object of this Halloween game is to see if you can get through the night without getting killed. You will need a scary Halloween costume, such as Jason, from Friday the 13, Freddy, or something unique. For this game you will also need a flashlight and a large, dark area in which to play. This game works for both indoors, and outdoors. Everyone, but the person who is it, hides, and the person who is it, puts on a Halloween costume and proceeds to find the party guests. As they find each one, the people who are found, must go lay in the cemetery, as if dead. The last one left that hasn’t been found, is the winner.
These are some fun and scary ways to entertain your guests at your next Halloween Party.

Halloween Props: Making Monster Mud

Monster Mud is probably the single most important item for a home haunter to have on hand, if they intend to create their own Halloween props and decorations.
Monster mud is a mixture of joint compound and paint. How to mix monster mud is often done according to personal preference and needs, but the common rule to make monster mud you need 1 part paint, and 5 parts joint compound.
Monster mud can be used in several different ways. It is often used to smooth around headstones, and crypts to give them a really rough stone look, or you can use it to create monsters, which is how it got its name in the first place.
First you create a frame out of PVC pipe, or some other type of framing, and then you wrap chicken wire in areas where you would like dimension, finishing it off by covering the chicken wire with duct tape. You may also create the torso, arms and legs entirely with chicken wire and duct tape. At this point you can duct tape a Styrofoam head onto the neck.
When your frame is complete, you take strips of cloth and dip in the monster mud, wrapping them around your monster until it is entirely covered. If you want to add extra layers you should let the first layer dry before adding more. The process could take several days. Once your monster is completely dry, you can paint him the way you would like and add a coat of acrylic clear coat to help provide some weather protection.
The more you use monster mud for creating your Halloween props and decorations, the more uses you will find for it.

Halloween Haunted House for Kids

Kids love to put on their own haunted house for Halloween, but until the advent of the inflatable haunted house, it wasn’t too easy. The inflatable haunted house can be put up in your yard so the kids can run their own haunted house, or you can add it as an element of your own home haunt.
Many of the people visiting your home haunt on Halloween Night will be there with their kids. We have always made a point of letting parents know that the haunted house, or spook alley may have elements that are not child friendly. In this way they can make an informed decision about if they want their kids to tour the haunted house or not. Some will go ahead and go through it anyway, others will opt to take their candy without entering.
Setting up the inflatable haunted house would be a way in which you can better accommodate your younger ghost and goblin visitors. Another option is to add a small section to your home haunt just for the younger crowd, and incorporate silly props, like funny face pumpkins, silly ghosts, etc.
Adding a haunted house just for kids can help get a crowd to your home haunt on Halloween, and keep them coming back every year.

The Origins of Halloween

Believe it or not, Halloween is actually a very old holiday; even older than Christmas, though it was not always celebrated as a holiday. Over 2000 years ago, Halloween was a very important festival for the Celts. Halloween was known as Samhain, which meant the end of summer. During this festival the people celebrated the harvest and honored the dead.
It was some of the beliefs of the Celts that actually gave Halloween its spooky nature. During this time, the Celts believed that there was no line or distinction between time and space and the dead were free to roam the earth. It was out of these beliefs that the people began to build big fires and provide offers so that they could appease the restless spirits that roamed the earth on Halloween. The Druid customs of honoring the dead was also brought into the Halloween mix, as well as that of the early Christians.
When people of Britain began spread out to other parts of the world, they also brought with them their Halloween traditions. Many of the traditions that exist today can be traced to these early Halloween rituals.
The world Halloween was taken from the words, All Hallows Eve.

Halloween Special Effects: Glowing Water

Glowing water is one of the easiest Halloween special effects there is to create. All it takes is some water, food coloring, or water based paint, and some glow sticks. The type of glow sticks that you use is the same type you can buy at novelty stores, or as necklaces and bracelets. This effect can be used in a water fountain, a bowl of punch, or any small area of standing water.
Simply fill with water, and add the color of food coloring, or paint that you need, and add a glow stick. If possible, use the appropriate colored glow stick to go with the color of water. When you are finished, you should have a liquid that appears as if it is giving off an unearthly glow.
This can work great for a ghostly fountain, a magical potion, especially if you ad a bit of dry ice to it. You can also use this Halloween special effect for you witch’s caldron.

Halloween Special Effects: The Importance of Lighting

The proper lighting of your haunt is a very important aspect of a successful haunted house. Lighting creates atmosphere, and helps to hide imperfections. Special effects, such as lighting and fog, can turn an average haunt scene into something truly creepy.
Imagine setting up your cemetery in the front yard, and then using a floodlight to illuminate it. The harsh light totally takes away from atmosphere. It may appear interesting, but will not be likely to cause anyone to look over their shoulder as they walk away.
By using a few simple lighting techniques you can transform your Halloween Haunted House into something extraordinary.
Black lights, flicker bulbs, and glow sticks are commonly used in lighting techniques, but there are also other types of lighting that work great for setting off your haunt scenes. You may discover that a certain scene works better with red lighting, and of course the ever-useful strobe light.
Try it for yourself; set up your scariest scene, and walk through it. Then do it again with different types of lighting to see which lighting effect best sets off the scene. Not all the time is the best lighting technique the most obvious. By trying out a variety of lighting options, you will better see what type of lighting fits that particular scene best.
In later posts I will tell you how you can use different lighting techniques to help put character into your terrifying scenes. Lighting can turn your Halloween haunted house into something the neighborhood will be talking about for months to come.

Halloween Home Haunt Ideas: The Mortuary

Though the mortuary theme is a classic, it still works well as a theme for a haunted house. Mortuaries still have a way of creeping out even the bravest of people, so it is a very good theme for a home haunt.
Some room ideas for a Halloween haunted house with a mortuary theme would be to have your entry room be the funeral parlor. This isn’t too hard to create, you will need a long folding table, the type that you can adjust the height, and a large black cloth to put over it.
Place your coffin on this table, with a corpse prop inside. Now you’ll want a couple Halloween candelabras to place on either side of the coffin, and some flower arrangements as well. Here you can get creative and use red and black roses. Use some artwork on the walls, such as gothic pictures to help create the right atmosphere.
If you want to get really creative, the corpse you have in the coffin can be animated to where it jumps up as people walk by, or you can place some other type of animation somewhere in the room to provide a good startle to your visitors. Don’t forget to add some cobwebs to this room.
It is in this room that your haunted house guide will begin their tour and start telling your visitors your back-story. Someone in an undertaker’s costume would be best for this roll.
The next room could be just a simple dark hallway, painted black so it appears as if it is a tunnel; add some glowing eyes to the walls.
Now your visitors can step into your morgue, complete with an autopsy room, and a wall full of coolers. This wall can be created with foam board, and some paint. The autopsy table in your haunted house should have a corpse laying on it that is in the middle of being dissected; you can either make this prop, or buy it.
In this room you should have an actor in a Halloween costume to match the character. Maybe they can have a fake scalpel in which they move towards your visitors.
For the next segment of your Halloween haunted house, you can lead your visitors into a body parts room, where there are lots of gory body parts, and you just happen to catch a mortuary assistant feasting on these.
Another section could be the crypt room, where of course you may want a ghost or two present to haunt the living. Exit from the crypt room into your graveyard; where you’ll have some zombie props, and some live actors in zombie costume ready to devour the flesh of your guests.
There are many different ways you can use the mortuary theme, these are just a few ideas, but I’m sure you can find many others.

Halloween Yard Decorations

These days you have some incredible choices for Halloween Yard Decorations. No need for any of those tacky flat headstones and a few hanging ghosts, with the variety of Halloween products on the market today; you can have a real Spookfest right in your front yard.
Whether you just want to add some fright to your yard for Halloween, or you are looking to run a home haunt this year, yard decorations are a must. Especially if you are putting on your own haunted house. Though you can purchase many of the Halloween yard decorations that you need, there are also a lot you can make yourself.
For the home haunter, the Halloween yard decorations that you choose should blend well with your overall theme. If your theme is a haunted house, you’ll want the old cemetery, maybe some zombies, eyes in the bushes, etc.
On the other hand, if you are just looking to jazz things up for the trick-or-treaters, a couple of inflatable decorations, and some witches may be sufficient.
In my opinion, one of the main focal points of the Halloween yard decoration should be the graveyard. This is usually one of the first things we start on every year. The headstones can be created from foam board found at hardware stores, or you can buy your graveyard headstones from a variety of stores that sale Halloween props.
Every spooky graveyard needs a fence, these are also available for purchase from Halloween stores, or you can make your own out of PVC pipe.
Though it’s not necessary, adding a crypt to your graveyard can really give it an eerie quality, especially if you can include a crank ghost, and other special effects that will be seen from outside the graveyard.
Other little additions that can add to the spook factor of your graveyard include, crows, maybe an undertaker prop, zombies, ghosts, and whatever adds to the eerie atmosphere you are trying to create. You probably don’t want to overcrowd your graveyard with props and decorations, as they will ruin the atmosphere, but add enough that the scene is helping to add to the storyline for your haunted house. A fog machine and a fog chiller, hidden strategically within the graveyard can really set off this scene. Ground fog just seems to add that creepy element to cemeteries, and it works for home haunt graveyards too.
If you are talented enough to build an old Victorian style hearse, this would be a great addition to your Halloween yard decorations, but if not, I did notice an inflatable hearse being sold last Halloween.
For the Halloween home haunt, the next important Halloween yard decoration would probably be the façade to your haunted house. This is one of the most neglected elements of home haunts, but it adds so much to atmosphere that if you can make one, I would advise it.
As your Halloween yard decorations are the first things that trick-or-treaters and visitors to your haunted house will see, you’ll want to be sure that they convey the spook element you want to create.

Theme is Important, Even for a Home Halloween Haunted House

Theme creates atmosphere, which sets the mood you are out to create. For a Halloween haunted house, theme is just as important as it is for those professional haunted houses, and atmosphere is exactly why most of the pros use theme.
To create a theme, you should first create some type of back-story for your Halloween haunt. If you have ever gone to a pro haunt, the one thing you probably noticed is that most all of them have some type of back-story that goes with the attraction.
One example is the Haunted Circus attraction; the back-story goes something like this.
“Many years ago, whenever the circus came to town people would start disappearing; when the police finally find out what was happening, it turns out that it was a crazed clown who was abducting the people, and turning them into zombies. The clown disappeared before the police could apprehend him, and to this day, he is said to haunt the circus, along with his unfortunate victims.”
Now you would take this back-story, and build your Halloween haunted attraction around it, as well as your props.
Any spooky story will work, as long as you keep your haunt within the boundaries of the story, it should flow smoothly; providing many chills and screams for your visitors.

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When to Start Planning Your Halloween Haunt

Basically the short answer to this is, “The sooner, the better.” This is especially true for those who have never put together a Halloween haunted house. These are really a lot of work, and it will take months of planning, and Halloween prop making in order to pull it off.
If you have done a haunted house before, then you’ll already have some props, and Halloween supplies, as well as some idea of what you will be doing. For the sake of simplicity, we’ll assume that you have never put together a Halloween haunted house before.
The first thing you need to do is decide on what your haunted house will consist of. Will it simply be a yard haunt, or will it be more elaborate, with a temporary construction in your yard, or garage? The larger your haunt, the earlier you will have to start on it.
Most people, who have been doing home haunts for years, actually begin their planning phase as soon as winter is over, if not sooner. This is a good rule to follow because it will give you plenty of time to get your supplies; start building props, and laying out your floor plan.
Warm, mild weather is somewhat important because much of your prop construction will have to be done outdoors, unless you are fortunate enough to have a workshop, or garage. Even though your Halloween prop building will have to wait until warmer weather, you can start the planning phase at anytime, though you should plan to be finished, and ready to go by at least the first week in October.
The first year you put on your own Halloween haunted house, out of necessity it may be smaller, but don’t be too surprised if it grows each year, and one day you find you have this monstrosity of a haunted house, that takes you a month to put up. Storage can also be a problem; half our basement is filled with Halloween props.
To start planning, write down exactly what your theme will be; once you have this, you can decide what the layout of your haunt will be, and what props you will need to create the perfect home haunt.
Researching, or buying your Halloween props will take some time; so keep this in mind. A good rule of thumb is to work on one room at a time. For example, if you plan to have a crypt room, get all the props prepared for this room, and then move on to another.
I have always started my planning phase in about March, and began the actual construction of props in late April or early May, but of course much of this depends on what the climate is like where you live.

About Halloween Home Haunts

Halloween is one of my favorite holidays, and every year we go all out to create a spooky and festive atmosphere. Some years we put up a neighborhood haunt, and other years we simply throw a Halloween party, but even these require a lot of planning and preparations.
Halloween home haunts have become more popular over the years; today you are likely to find at least one in every neighborhood. Some people wonder why on earth a grown adult would waste so much time and energy, on what they conceive to be a children’s holiday; the answer is easy. It’s fun!
Constructing the props and preparing for that spookiest of all nights is nearly as fun as Halloween itself. Yes, it is a lot of work, but the end result is well worth it, especially for those of us that are still a kid at heart, which is the funniest way to be.
This blog is really about all things Halloween, from preparing your home haunt, to costumes, as well as old Halloween stories and legends. I can almost guarantee that after your first Halloween home haunt you’ll be hooked.