Halloween at The House that Worked Out

Living in the MIDDLE OF NOWHERE with the nearest neighbours kilometres away, we miss out on Halloween traditions like Trick or Treating (never mind that 1. even if we did have neighbours, most people in Australia don’t celebrate Halloween anyway and 2. if we tried Trick or Treating in our area, we are far more likely to be shot at or attacked by vicious dogs than to receive any treats).  But this year, we celebrated Halloween in style.

While living in a 1 room cabin with the rest of the family, I used to fantasize about having big Halloween parties when the House that Worked Out was complete, with extravagant decorations, exciting activities, and a themed menu. This despite the fact that we have never spent any energy on creating a themed holiday, ever. Sometimes our Christmas tree doesn’t even make it out of the box. Somehow, though, we would become different people once our house was finished, and we would hold magnificent parties that everyone would want to attend.

Fast forward to a few days before Halloween 2015, and Halloween wasn’t magically making itself happen. We finally realised that creating a cool Halloween event would mean a bit of EFFORT, so we knuckled down and got started with our Test Run Halloween Party. Here are the parts that worked.

Decorations

The Grim Reaper

The excellent tutorial for this project is here. We didn’t use Monster Mud on our Grim Reaper, and it ended up being a bit more Ring Wraith than Grim Reaper. But without the Monster Mud, its robe flaps in the wind which is creepy as well. We kept expecting it to turn its head!

Gravestones

This gravestone tutorial is amazing. We didn’t go to anywhere near as much effort and our gravestones still looked reasonable.

Coffin

I think an Eastern European villager coffin is way creepier than the stereotypically elegant, satin-lined Count Dracula coffin, and being made from wooden pallets, it’s easy on the hip pocket as well. We tried putting dry ice in it so it would look as though a vampire was escaping in mist form, but the effect was hardly noticeable. Drape heavyweight chains around this baby to look as though you really don’t want the resident escaping. And another use for the coffin- it can be a really cool serving table!  Here is our inspiration.

Human Head Specimens

See image at the top of the post.  These are unbelievably easy and unbelievably realistic.  The hardest part is finding large jars. I followed this video.

Menu Items

Human Hands

We try to eat healthily most of the time and didn’t want this to be a candy-ridden affair, so we stuck to a BBQ dinner with a bonfire. These human hand hamburger patties are nice and creepy.

Brain Cake

Our one concession as far as a sweet treat was this brain cake. And we had it just because I wanted to try to make it. It is actually pretty easy to make and the wow factor definitely makes this something to spend time on.  Instructions here.  Just for the record, I made a chocolate mud cake because we don’t like red velvet.  It worked fine as a base.

Activities

Activities

There are some LAMEASS Halloween games out there on the internet. We have the benefit of having lots of space.  Here are some ideas for a more physical Halloween experience:

1. Impale the Vampire Archery- attach some balloons to a human-shaped cutout with a red balloon at the heart and you have an exciting themed activity for older kids to adults.   Of course, you need to have an archery set-up, which we do. Use different coloured balloons in rings and make a point system. Guests can be divided into teams.  (If you lack space and have no archery set-up because you are uncool, this could easily be done as a darts game).
2. Zombie Run- a timed run through an obstacle course to escape the zombies. Must include climbing, crawling, balance beam walking, and any other movements necessary to escape a flesh-eating zombie. For more of an adrenaline rush, you can have an adult in zombie costume doing the chasing. We have so many ideas for this for next time- a black plastic ‘slide’, a crawl through goo or mud, a target ball toss (Bomb the Zombie Nest?), a puzzle which must be completed (is Assemble the Firearm- fake, obviously- going too far?) , so many other cool, fun things to try!
3. Apple Bobbing- Very traditional but still good value.  We used a big cast iron bathtub containing different coloured apples, and had the different colours worth different points. Divide people into teams and have a person from each team going at the same time for a timed period.
4. The Haunted Walk- we have a 1km walk on the property which was perfect as a substitute for a Haunted House experience. Ask people to bring head torches. This was a HUGE success.
5. Adventure Race/Treasure Hunt- We didn’t do this, but next year I’d like to also have an orienteering-style/Adventure Race style event where people have to build their own raft to cross the dam, use a compass to get to set coordinates, and solve puzzles or clues.  Basically a game I would love someone to make for me!!

There are so many cool activities possible on a rural property.  We didn’t have many indoor activities aside from a horror movie for late at night, but we had a backup list of lameass indoor activities in case of inclement weather.

So, there you have it, our first, proper, organised, Test Run Halloween party, and it was a great success. We have some ideas for other props we want to make, but you’ll have to wait until next year to see those.

How was your Halloween? What great ideas worked for you?