# voodoo on the bayou 2012



## Sublime Nightmare (Aug 2, 2009)

So I've been doing large family-oriented Halloween parties for 5 years. Each year, it gets a little bigger and better with the accumulation of props and ideas over the years and with my kids getting older, a little more scary. Last year, my husband and I attempted our first haunted walk through. We have a small patch of pines in the middle of a 5 acre field and used plywood boards covered in black plastic staked in the ground to make a path through the "forest." It was a huge hit. There was no theme, just a modge podge of macabre items including the jumping spider, cauldron stirring witch, animated spell book with potions, a small cemetery. This year, I'm going with a theme because it's easier, I think. We've settled on a voodoo swamp and since we've added a 10' x 50' covered front porch to our house, I'm moving the haunt to our front yard to end on the porch. These are my plans and I hope it comes out close to what I'm picturing in my head.

I bought the cardboard lamp posts and lanterns from Spirit last season. I'm using these as the entrance and will have a greeter to let one family in at a time. Along the path, I'm using bamboo poles in the ground with witch lanterns (mason jars and tea lights) to light the way. There's a pine tree at the entrance that I will put the hedge shaker eyes in. I'm also making a cornfield type entrance before the swamp starts. We bought the Harvester to put with the corn field along with another static scare crow I made. Then, when they get to the paved part of our drive way, I'll have a wooden arch entrance they have to walk through that will have the battery operated flame torches on. The jumping spider will be on the other side as soon as they walk through. As they come down the drive, my husband will come up behind the guests in a guilley (sp?) to scare them and then cross the drive and sit under another tree where the grave yard will be. Then they will pass the grave yard which has an animated zombie ground breaker. In this myrtle tree over the grave yard, I will have lots of spanish moss and more mason jars hanging. Then they turn onto the sidewalk which runs alongside our front porch. Here, I will line the sidewalk with lots of cattails and grasses to look swampy which also hides a 4 foot alligator. As guests walk towards the steps, my husband will yank the pull cord to make the gator jump in front of them. At the top of the steps, I will have a zombie fogger. At the back of the porch, I'm closing in a space in black plastic and suspending a black light. This is going to be the voodoo room. Hanging from the black walls will be those plain white masks. Then there will be a table with potion bottles, my spell book, a rubber chicken and bloody white feathers, lots of candles and voodoo chanting playing. My friend will be dressed in all black with a white mask and as guests are looking at the voodoo table, he will jump towards them for a good scare.
I've also remade my cauldron stirring witch into a voodoo priestess and will set her up near the entrance of the voodoo room. 
On the rest of the porch, I'm hanging lots of moss, dark green dyed tattered cheesecloth, etc to look swampy. I also have made out of sticks and skulls, little voodoo doll type decorations to suspend. The tables will be covered in burlap and I will be serving cajun food.

I hope this turns out the way I want! I'm very excited and wish I could get started now instead of later.


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