# Last minute haunted house



## The Corner of Carnage (Aug 28, 2016)

Hi,
Today is Tuesday October 26 and as you all know Halloween is on Sunday. Originally my wife and I were going on a short vacation for Halloween weekend. I made the difficult decision not to do my annual haunted house this year and I felt kinda bad about it but was still excited to go to Salem for Halloween once again. In light of the terrible weather forecast for this weekend in Salem we decided to cancel the trip. That prompted me to come up with a way to do a haunt for Halloween and not break my annual streak. I decided I would set up one scene in my garage that I could pack a few scares into and that uses a set and props I already have on hand. 

Some background about my current situation is that I am married with a four year old that I take care of during the day. I work a full time night shift. My dad used to watch my daughter so I could work an earlier shift but he has been hospitalized from a bad injury and while he was there they discovered he had COVID and pneumonia. He is doing well considering but obviously is not in any shape to chase around a four year old. That being said my "haunt prep time" is extremely limited. I plan on working at least one hour a night (the witching hour hehe) after I get out of work. and doing some serious crunch time on Friday since I have a scheduled day off due to my cancelled vacation. I wanted to do YouTube videos but the time needed is just not available and I can't stand to hear my own voice on recording so I will document it daily here in a mini blog.

Look for the first entry tonight with pictures!


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## The Corner of Carnage (Aug 28, 2016)

Went for about an hour tonight. It’s been raining all day. The plan is to construct the set smack dab in the middle of the garage. TOTs will enter and exit through a single doorway into a short hall and into the set.
It will be a crypt theme with an animatronic as the main draw and with a second animatronic and myself to scare them from the wings. I will give them their candy and hit them with compressed air at the ankles on the way out.

Tonight I will focus on clearing out the space in the center of the garage. I’m having trouble getting the pictures to upload probably because I’m using a phone tomorrow I’ll try from my computer.

Made some progress. Tomorrow hopefully it will stop raining and I can work on clearing access to the front wall and, if I’m lucky, I’ll get it installed also.


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## The Corner of Carnage (Aug 28, 2016)

Here's the pics from the first night:
Before:








After:








The plan:


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## The Corner of Carnage (Aug 28, 2016)

Got to work on it for about an hour this afternoon with my daughter. Managed to get the front put on while my dog decided to roll in poop .
















Hit the first roadblock. I wanted to have one door in and out but my front is only able to do two doors because of the way I constructed the door frames. I will still only use one door the one to the right most likely. I will try and get to it again tonight because tomorrow is do or die!


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## Kdestra (Jul 23, 2018)

You are so incredibly organized. Hope you were able to work out the doors. 
P.S. - I hate hearing my own voice as well so don't let that stop you


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## The Corner of Carnage (Aug 28, 2016)

Even though the actual event took place over a month ago, finally, the thrilling conclusion of this "blog" has arrived!

Here is the set mostly constructed. Normally I would cleanout my garage entirely but this year it was a little challenging navigating the wall panels through my mess.









To support the "Compost Corpse" animatronic inside of the tomb I used a heavy duty garbage can turned over.









The tomb mostly constructed.









A rising ghost animatronic will sit atop of the electric heater in this picture and be positioned behind a curtain. Of course I have no pictures of the ghost.









Having a background in video production I always have gaffers tape on hand!









Interior all finished! The candy bowl will sit on top of the mound/table thing in front of the tomb. TOTs will take their own portion this year which in hindsight was a bad idea. We ran out of candy and ended up tearing open a box of granola bars as an offering to the hoards. Luckily the night was winding down.









Exterior always goes smooth except this year I went through the trouble of gluing the skull back atop the rules plaque but knocked off the skull that was atop the enter sign while I was screwing it into place. Oh well, I dabbed black sharpie over any pink foam that was exposed and moved on. In the past I've used Loctite foamboard adhesive the glue the plastic skulls to the foamboard and it works but always needs to be repaired every year. This year I used clear silicone and it seems to be a better hold but I can already see it coming apart. Anybody got any pointers? 

The purple curtain is new this year and I love the way it pops with the grey. It has inspired me to add more colors into sets in the future. 









Halloween night was great! I got to host in front of the house for the first time since my first year (2016) and I got to talk with some of the people who enjoy coming to my house every year for Halloween. It was a much needed confidence boost. Overall I'm happy I decided to do this and not break my annual streak as I know it would have been missed in the community.


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