# Glue Gun Engraved Tombstones



## darkpenguincowboy (Sep 28, 2008)

basically, you want to brainstorm first, just what do you want your stone to look like? What shape do you want it to be? what do you want to really stand out? Do you want it to look old, or new? Will it be humerous, or serious? 

Once you have got a basic sketch, take your foam board and draw out a basic outline for the stone. In this example, i used a cross, but yours could be a rectangle, rounded rectangle, or any shape you want it to be. 

Make sure that the foam is at least an inch and a half thick, i used two, but anything thinner, and the hotglue gun may melt all the way through. 

Go to word and type out the message you want, in the font you want. I found it very helpful to turn the page to "landscape", which flips it horizontally. Find the right size you want, and print it out. i discovered afterwards that it may be helpful to switch the style to "emboss", which will give you just the outline of the letters.

Using your sketch as a guide, position the letters on the stone and tape them into place with a bit of clear tape.
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The next step will be to use a small, sharp nail or knife to puncture small holes along the outlines of all the letters. Dont be afraid to push hard to really transfer the hole through. The sharper the object, the easier this is, just be careful. This is by far the slowest part of the entire process, depending on how many letters you have, this coudl take anywhere from five minutes to half and hour.
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If you havent already, plug in your glue gun. Make sure that the gun had no glue sticks in it, as this may accidentally leak out durring the shaping, and cause damage to your stone. It will take at least a few minutes to warm up, so i suggest plugging it in a little over half way through the hole puncturing. Once it is hot enough, i really reccomend you practice on a scrap piece of foam at first. Practice making smooth, stright lines, gradually getting deeper towards the center, and then gradually coming back up to the top. Once you are comfortable with this, practice making the same valley-like motions in a curve, getting deeper and wider in the middle of the curve, then popping back up easilly towards the end. 

After you are completely comfortable with this, you may notice a few things. 
1. What is that weird, sweet smell and smoke coming from the end of the glue gun?
2. There is a build up of melted foam on the end of the gun, can i do anything to clean it?
3. Is this going to do any permenant damage to my lungs?

To answer numbers one and three, the smell is vaporizing foam, the smoke is vaporized foam, and yeah, you should probably be wearing a mask, but as long as you arent sitting there in a sealed box, inhaling the vapors like there is no tommorow, i doubt you will be doing any serious damage. My advice is to just work in an open space, like a garage, and if you really are bothered by the smell (which really isnt that bad) put up a small fan to blow the fumes away.

To detail the letters, you will need to follow a basic pattern. the thinner the line, the shallower the melt. 
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Try to start out with a shallow area, like the top of an S. Dont be afraid if you go outside the lines, you can always go back and correct. Just be sure to only correct slightly, or else you will end up with giant letters.
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You will want to transition smoothly from areas of shallower depth to areas of deeper and wider topography, but dont worry, you can always go back through and smooth out rough edges. Be patient, it takes practice and time to get steady (heck, even i am not there yet!)


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## darkpenguincowboy (Sep 28, 2008)

alright, here are a series of pics of the depth of an "S" curve. The pencil helps to show just how the curve gets deeper towards the center of the curve, and shallower as it heads to the ends.
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## darkpenguincowboy (Sep 28, 2008)

here are some of the pics of the final designs of the tombstones i have done so far. I wont be able to access the foam cutter until tuesday, so for now this is as far as i can go with the tut, but i promise more pictures to come, as soon as i get these babies cut out. 

please feel free to ask questions, comment, and just let me know how i am doing, as this is only my second tut ever. (constructive criticism highly encouraged!)

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i was thinking possibly LEDs for the eye? what do you think?
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The three dates are for when he was first burried, and then subsiquently dug up and burried once more. for some reason i have had to explain that to like five people. In the final one, the first two will be crossed out
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## [email protected] (Oct 9, 2008)

Tell them to watch young frankenstein they have that gag there too.Love some of the names.also you can get what is called a pounce wheel at an art supply store and some pounce chalk. I learn this for a sign painter friend.what it does is you trace the shape or letters with the pounce wheel and it pokes little holes though the paper,the you use the pounce chalk over the holes you made and it gives an outline.fast and easier than the poke holes with a nail method.


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## darkpenguincowboy (Sep 28, 2008)

yeah, i thought of somthing similar, but was like, "ehh, what the heck, i am just going to do a few." something like that would have been soo helpful, thank you for putting a name to the product, i just called it a spikey pizza cutter up till now

I have a few more names i really want to try out, and i will be sure to post pics of them and these when they all get cut out on tues. thank you for the encouragement, like i said anything and everything is welcome, this has really been a learning experience so far


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## Terra (Sep 23, 2007)

That's a good idea using the glue gun! And I love your sayings and designs. It's funny about the glue gun idea. That's how the coolest ideas are born, out of regular stuff we use everyday.


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## darkpenguincowboy (Sep 28, 2008)

thank you very much for the compliments! i tried to brain storm a list of names i hadnt heard before, but still sounded creepy/humerous, not just something like, "Here lies Fred, He's dead, He fell on his head, Poor Fred!" (we actually used this stone for a while)

i just really wanted to get this method out there, cause i had known about it for a long time, and hadnt seen it posted yet, i just hoped it hadnt been a common knowledge piece of info already! i would be thrilled if even a few people with, heh, "limited" crafting skills (like me) benefitted from this.


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## Halloween Princess (Sep 23, 2008)

Thank you for the idea. I am going to try it. I have never worked with foam though. Does it matter what color you use? I am not sure what the difference is between pink foam, blue foam....


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## Frankie's Girl (Aug 27, 2007)

It is not a new technique - this is the link to one of the first ones I've seen from a few years back... (check hauntproject.com - that's where I've seen this method before)

The Skeleton's Hand: 2008 Countdown #4

It is still a great method, tho!  Good job, and nice execution!




darkpenguincowboy said:


> thank you very much for the compliments! i tried to brain storm a list of names i hadnt heard before, but still sounded creepy/humerous, not just something like, "Here lies Fred, He's dead, He fell on his head, Poor Fred!" (we actually used this stone for a while)
> 
> i just really wanted to get this method out there, cause i had known about it for a long time, and hadnt seen it posted yet, i just hoped it hadnt been a common knowledge piece of info already! i would be thrilled if even a few people with, heh, "limited" crafting skills (like me) benefitted from this.


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## Mr_Chicken (Nov 30, 2008)

Frankie's Girl said:


> It is not a new technique - this is the link to one of the first ones I've seen from a few years back... (check hauntproject.com - that's where I've seen this method before)
> 
> The Skeleton's Hand: 2008 Countdown #4
> 
> It is still a great method, tho!  Good job, and nice execution!


That's mine. I wrote it last year, but I've been doing it since 2007. I've found that it works best in conjunction with one of these hotwire cutters for sharp corners (I got mine at Michaels).

As far as types of foam goes, this technique will work on all of them, but it melts more slowly through some than others.


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## darkpenguincowboy (Sep 28, 2008)

aww man 

well, that was what i thought to myself, it seemed so simple, i couldnt think of how it hadnt been thought of before. oh well though, no harm done, if anything i just brought it back to the forefront of people's attention. sorry mr. chicken, all the credit goes to you! 

i will be getting the stones cut out tommorow, as i will have access to the school's foamcutter, and yeah, i dont think it really matters what color you use.


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## Mr_Chicken (Nov 30, 2008)

Great minds think alike, I guess 
I'll tell ya, I was excited to see someone else discovered the technique. It's so easy, effective, and _clean_ (there's no cleanup!). Frankly, I don't see why more people don't use it.

Keep us updated on your 'stones!


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## darkpenguincowboy (Sep 28, 2008)

hello again! 
sorry about the long absence, but i had things going on, but i finally got my tombstones cut out!

well, at least one of them. For time sake, i ahd to use my table saw to sut out the cross, but i would reccomend you make friends with someone with a hot wire foam cutter, it will help a lot more! I would have been able to get them all cut out using this method, if it were not for the fact I couldnt get all of the tombstones there at once to cut. so it may still be a while before i can get them all cut out, but i pushed ahead for the sake of the tutorial.

here is the cross stone so far with some penciled-in cracks (sorry about it being sideways, i forgot to flip it around, and it wont let me do it with the new transfer software i have to upload from my camera)
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To make the cracks, i used a standard pocket knife (very sharp of course, so be careful, as if i needed to say it) I angled the knife so it was a very shallow cut, and then came in from the other side, to make a "V" shaped wedge that followed the pencil line. Remember to be very sharp with your corners, i have never heard of a smooth crack. Another advantage of the knife is that it isnt very clean looking, so it really adds to the overall effect of the tombstone. If you cut too deep or wide, dont worry, wood putty should be fine to patch it up, just smooth it off, and when you paint, it will be near invisible.
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Here is a close up on the first crack i made (personally i like this one better because it runs much shallower than the second, which will need to be thinned out before painting) sorry again about the blurriness
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I thought this angle capured the depth of things really well, and it shows both the cracks without washing them out too much
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this front shot shows the progress to this point, but the flash really takes away from the cracks, you'll just have to take my word that they are there
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## darkpenguincowboy (Sep 28, 2008)

you know, i didnt really explain the base of the cross, mainly because i didnt want to draw attention to this small detail if things went awry and it didnt turn out right (i was planning on using it as a nice decoration for our haunted hay-ride wagon) When it turned out decent, i figured i may as well cover this piece as well. I do have a word of caution, I am a bit of an overthinker, so if you want to wing it, please do, but I, *cough*cough*, got a bit "technical" in planning it out. Feel free to skip the _enormous _ mathmatical explanation, even I dont know why I made it sooooooooooooo extensive.

Here is a pic of just the base. In the background is what will be a prop gun for our clown scene this year. it is an old stink-blaster's gun (thank goodness for younger siblings!) i'll probably paint it to disguise it, but it makes a nice big boom and pop when it is fired, followed by a large burst of air (confetti anyone?)
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The base is actually two seperate pieces, one smaller one that goes on the larger one. 
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WARNING
MATH AHEAD
I recycled the foam from either side of the skinny part on the cross to make these parts, and i must say it does take a bit of planning to get them the right size. This is the part where a sketch would really come in handy. Granted it doesnt have to be a detailed, scientific sketch, but try to make it to scale. Luckily i had a calculator nearby, but you will need to first divide the actual length of the cross part of the cross (hope that made sense) by the length of the same part in the sketch. Then take this number, and multiply it by the length of the longer part of the base in the sketch. Round this to the nearest whole interval (I used quarters of an inch, but if you dont want to mess, whole inches would probably work without being too distorted). I just guessed at the width, but it should probably be a around a half to a quarter of the length. Do the same for the small piece, and then use a ruler and sketch the dimensions on each piece of foam. I did this before I cut out the cross, but if you save the pieces, you should be fine too.

Next, you will want to sketch out the inside of each piece, and to do this I used, duh-dah-duh-duh, an EQUATION! WHOO-HOO!
O.K., so it may not be the most exciting thing ever, but i wanted to make sure the hole would be centered. For the width, i used this formula "Width of the cross (where it will meet the base)= 2x + the width of the foam core (mine was two inches, you may have 1 1/2, or even 1)". For the length, you do the same basic formula, but use the length of the base and the length of the cross where it will meet the base. All you have to do is solve for "x". And for those who dont want migraines from the overthinking, tracing the bottom of the cross probably would work fine in hind sight.

Well, now that we have the outside of each piece cut out, we need to get the inside cut out, and to do this, I just used my drill press to drill a hole at each corner of the inside outline. A hand drill would be a perfect substitute as well, with a suitably large drill bit.
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Once I had each of the corners drilled out, I used my pocket knife to cut from corner to corner, and then popped each center out. I made adjustments as necessary by dry fitting the cross into each piece. 
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Here is the final product, sans the cross. I will be sure to keep everyone updated as progress is made, next I hope to get going with the "roughing up" with spray paint. First time, wish me luck!
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## darkpenguincowboy (Sep 28, 2008)

ok, we have had a pretty on and off rainy week, so it made the weathering process harder (go figure), but i made a little more progress on my cross stone.

To give it that rocky appearance, I used the old technique of spray paint and uneven strokes. I went extra heavy around the edges and the cracks, cause naturaly these parts would be among the first to be eaten away at. I do have to say, I am not the best painter in the world, so yet again, I encourage you to look at Terra's tuts for a much better description of this part of the finishing process.

Using the spray paint, I stood about a foot from the tombstone and sprayed in an erratic pattern, up and down, left and right, never stopping for too long over one particular place. DOnt worry if it doesnt seem to be doing too much at this point, if you sit and watch, even the smallest amount of spray paint will eat away at the foam, giving it a nice look and (eventually) feel. I say eventually because until it drys, the foam will be a sticky mess of toxic foam goo, which will end up pulling itself from the tombstone and attaching to whatever touches it (hands, clothing, small pets....). Just let it sit out and cure for a little while. When doing the edges and sides, I used just a bit more to really give them a weathered look. Dont worry if you can still see some of the writing on the back or extra lines from the sketching process, this will not be the final paint job, this is just to give it the texture of real stone.

This pic was taken after the first spray over with the paint, and a little ways into the detailing of the letters.
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Due to the uneven depth of the letters caused by the glue gun, you may find it useful to paint a layer of black paint on the inside of each letter. I used a thick paint brush for the deeper parts, and a thinner one for the more shallow details. Dont worry about being neat, just try to get eveything covered. I found stabbing motions coupled with long strokes for the smoother areas worked best, so it would be best not to use a good high quality brush for this. (dollar store people know my face by heart now).

Here are the deeper areas painted, witht he shallower ones still to go.
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I was debating whether or not to do anything to highlight the cracks, but in the end i decided that painting a defined line down the center wouldnt look too natural, so I made a compromise and dipped my thin brush, then removed most of the paint from it against the side of the can and made a broken line following each crack in the middle. For this though, I did not make sure that the line was solid, and i personally think it makes it look all the better.

Here is a close up on the crack, which i hope helps to clarify what I did better than my description.
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After I did this, I called it a day and let it sit to dry. Looking back, I probably would have glued the base together BEFORE the weathering process, but live and let learn. Here is a picture of the cross itself after painting and crack detailing.
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Until this thing dries I wont be able to do much, so until later, happy haunting.


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## Sean Chappell (May 8, 2009)

This is a great idea. I'm already planning the graveyard that's going to be in front of my house! Rockin'! Thanks for the tips.


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## Halloween Princess (Sep 23, 2008)

Do you have any updated pictures available?


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## Halloween Princess (Sep 23, 2008)

Oops, nevermind. I had this bookmarked from a while back. I see the new stuff now.


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## billman (May 1, 2006)

You could also use a soldering iron...


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## BioHazardCustoms (Jul 19, 2009)

Those things look great! Good job, darkpenguincowboy!


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## spooky little girl (Aug 22, 2006)

Great idea! You just saved me buying a soddering iron!


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## darkpenguincowboy (Sep 28, 2008)

Hey guys! Let me start off by saying I am sooo sorry that I havent posted anything in a few months. Between various household projects, family obligations, and vacations, I have been trying to squeeze this project in at all possible free moments I have. Now that I have that said, back to the tut.

Finally, I am on the homestretch, but unfortunately I forgot to take a picture of one of the most important steps if you want your stones to last. I was lucky enough to have a can of Dry-Lock that was mostly full in the basement, but you may need to buy some if you dont already have any lying around. I reccomend that you use Dry-Lock brand just because I havent tried any other types. If you find something that works better, go right ahead, as long as it can seal off the foam. I also suggest that you use the ready to use kind, it is just more convienient.

I applied the dry-lock compound with the paint stirrer first, like frosting on a cake, and then used a paintbrush to spread it further, but leaving a generous amount covering each area. The finishing touch that will give the surface some added texture is to go back over the surface with the paintbrush in a stabbing motion, so the bristles pull it out and dirstress it, so there are no brushmarks. 

The back side is the easy one to coat, as it is a mostly flat surface, but when it comes to the front, I used the same technique as I used with the black inside the letters to cover the insides of the engraved areas. 

After applying two coats of dry-lock to each side, I went back around the edges of each stone as I realized they had started to crack in the areas that were touching the ground and hitting into things. I just used a small paintbrush to aplly more generously around the outer edges.

Once I was done, I filled the letters in with black, and they ended up looking like this:
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To make things easier on myself, I....*ahem*....cheated...on the cross stone. I used a can of stone textured spray-paint. I think that it looks OK, but not great. I prefer the techniques that give layers and add depth. It looks sort-of flat, and so I may end up giving it a little something extra in the end, but for now it looks good enough.
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I do have to add, however, that if you are planning on spray-painting your stones, you really need to get that coat of dry-lock on there thick, or it will continue to eat away at the foam.

Well, that is a whole lot for now, but I have even more pictures for tommorow. I finally figured out a technique that works for me, and I hope to have them all finished by the end of this week.


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## darkpenguincowboy (Sep 28, 2008)

Alright, once you have coated the entire surface of your stone with dry-lock, and have allowed for it to dry, and then filled the lettering and detail work with black panit, you can get started with the real painting! HOORAY!!

The method I used is a rather basic one, and I, yet again, suggest you look at some of Terra's genius work before you even pick up a sponge. I am just going to give a quick overview of how I painted the stones, but there are much better ways out there, and Terra has developed some great tricks and tips to get them looking very realistic.

I started with a base coat of flat, dark grey paint on each side. To cover evenly without any edge marks and get rid of any brush marks, I used a regular kitchen sponge whose edges I had ripped off. They are vey cheap, I got a pack of 15 for a buck.
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Just pour a small amount of paint onto a paper plate, and then lightly dab it onto the surface of the stone.
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Dont worry about getting it into the lettering, because one of the great things about sponging on paint is that unlike paint brushes, there is very little excess paint, and so it doesnt collect at the edges of cracks or recesses. Thus you can paint over the letters, covering up the messy edges, and leaving the inside neatly black.
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These are the pictures of the stones just after their coat of grey paint, still wet, but there is a hint of good things to come.
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I am getting really excited about these, as I have spent several months making them bit by bit, and they are really comming together nicely. I just have to touch up the cross stone, and do some dry-brushing on the two others, but now I am on the home stretch, and I really want to thank all the people who have kept with me along the way!


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## darkpenguincowboy (Sep 28, 2008)

WHOOHOO, I finally finished them! Atleast until I put some fake moss on them, but still!

Once the grey paint is dry, you can call it quits, and be done, or you can add a really easy and cheap embelishment to them to add a great deal of realism to them. This technique has been used by countless people before me (Terra, Spooky Blue, pretty much all of the greats) and they all rave about it. I was painting my fence a few day back, and just decided to give it a try after wards, and let me tell you, it was sooooooo worth it if you want that professional touch.

This is basically if where you get a normal sized paint brush, some white paint, and some news paper, or some other dry object that you can paint on (For me it was my fence). You dip the paint brush in the paint, and wipe most of the paint off on the object until you can ake the brush and swipe it across you arm with no decernable streaks of paint, just whisps. 

When you have reached this stage, take the brush and just lightly sweep the surface of the stone with the tip, as if you were dusting for finger prints. Soon, you should be noticing that the raised areas on your stone are beginning to lighten, while the deeper areas are remaining a darker color. This simple technique is probably the easiest part of this entire walkthrough, and yet it probably will be the most effective and noticeable part of you entire design.

You may go over the surface as few or as many times as you like, until you feel satisfied with the level of detail it shows.

Here are the final frontal pics of the stones, and let me tell you, picures cannot begin to show the difference the dry-brushing makes (not to mention, my camera sucks, so they came out slightly blurry).
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I know I already posted these, but they show the dry-brushing better than the final frontal pictures.
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For the cross, as you may or may not have noticed, the bottom looked significantly lighter than the top, leaving me slightly dissapointed with the oevrall look of that piece. So, I used a variation on the dry-brushing technique to darken the oevrall appearance of the stonework, but lightly slapping the sponge against the surface of the stone cross once it was at the same point the brush was. Then, I took a paper towel and smoothed the areas out. Then I took a smaller brush and lightly filled in the shallower parts of the writing on the cross, which were blending in too much, and filled in the crack more. Then end result is alot better, and I think I may eventually hot glue some peat moss on one of the sides, but for now here is the finished cross.
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I really hope anyone trying this has the greatest of luck in the end, and thank you for your support along the way. I you have any questions or any pics of your takes on this, please feel free to post them, I will try to answer them as best as I can. I am thinking I may even get out my green spotlights to take some night pics too, but until then, Happy Haunting!


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