Halloween 2011

Here we are, last chance I’ll have time to write up my progress until my party is over! I’m taking Thursday and Friday off work so I can hopefully get everything done and even some sleep along the way if I’m lucky. 😉

Another splurge arrived! Pottery Barn had sold out of these skeleton hand spigot jar stands last year before I even got the catalog, so this year I ordered online back in September, but they didn’t ship until Oct 17th. The jar was sold separately for $70(!) so I just bought the stand, which was expensive enough! It doesn’t fit my spigot jar, but it does fit my crystal bowl, so I think it will hold some lighted Mojitoes nicely.

Even though it was well past dark, all the major painting was finished on Sunday night, including the new archway for the patio. Here it is in place, along with the two freshly-painted plastic gargoyles that will hang on the walls flanking the archway after the door goes in. I’m letting my kitties enjoy the patio for as long as they can, since they’re cooped up during the party, and they can’t open the screen door but they can scoot open the arch door!

I was able to drill through from my garage to the patio, so the patio webcam is still working, now without ugly cables! I hope there’s enough lighting, since the main patio light fixture has failed, not working even with brand-new bulbs, so I’m relying on the chandelier, floor lamp & lighted lab display. A new patio light fixture is now on the list for the next Stitches Project Weekend with my dad in February.

Secret project #1 is a go, all technical issues resolved with replacements, stable stand built and painted, ready for testing in final setup Friday night. Crossing my fingers for no rain but the forecast looks good so far…I can’t wait to reveal this one!

Even though I was painting well into Sunday night and sewing by streetlight in my driveway, secret project #2 is all ready for installation tomorrow! I think this will rival the gingerbread haunted house as the most elaborate and time-consuming single Halloween project, but I do think my guests will be surprised and impressed. I would still be painting if I hadn’t invested in my new sprayer that worked like a charm!

I didn’t have enough trophies leftover from last year for all the contests, plus I couldn’t find those skeleton hands this year, so I whipped up some new trophies, now all ready to print out the labels on my new inkjet gold foil label paper!

Speaking of gingerbread, I decided that piping royal icing siding would give the look I want better than rolling fondant and stamping with woodgrain pattern, plus hopefully help protect the gingerbread against ambient moisture. All the exterior wall siding was piped Monday night, using about 9 cups of royal icing! I decided this year to splurge on meringue powder instead of having a ton of egg yolks leftover, but I’ve already almost used the whole can! Even though my hand and arm were sore from piping the stiff icing, I really do like the look. After I took the photo, I shaded the walls with black & purple sprays for some run-down haunted feel.

I peeled off all the black candy melt shingles from last year (no one has black candy melts this year so I’m sure glad I bought a ton last year!), melted some into modeling chocolate to rollout for the shingles & some window trim, then melted more plain directly in a plastic piping bag in the microwave. These are the railings, brackets & gate that I sure hope will survive assembly! I made them thick, and I hope the back side will be a cleaner look since it will all be flat, but we’ll see. I did a test peel at a railing corner and removed a spider, and those were okay already. If they seem too fragile or are warming up too quickly from handling, I’ll pop them in the freezer so they’re nice & solid before attaching to the house. Once they’re on I think they’ll be fine, but they will also be one of the last things for fear of anything falling on them or me bumping them while decorating other bits or adding figures!

Last night, I decorated the chairs and pipe organ with “carved” detail piping, brown icing on raw gingerbread. Tonight I will add purple fondant tufted cushions to the chairs, couch, benches & lounge chair, then royal ice them together and brace them to dry in proper shape.

Of course my haunted house must include a pipe organ! 🙂 The pipe organ pipes are hard candy sticks sprayed with silver luster dust from the Ace of Cakes decorating line since handbrushing luster dust wouldn’t look as smooth. You can see the other pipe organ pieces in the carving photo, with the two curved sides, music stand, and the curved double keyboard. I’ll add white fondant for the keys, then pipe black chocolate for the black keys, then add the pipe rank to the back during assembly. It also has a matching bench that will get a fondant cushion but will probably be mostly covered by character clues.

I have finished my costume enough to wear, but I’m really hoping to squeeze in a little more accent decorating if there is any chance. Here is the matching hat I made from scratch. Any guesses yet? 🙂

Thankfully the inside is mostly cleaned and decorated except for the kitchen that is always a war zone, especially with all the gingerbread work going on. Friday the housecleaners come, some of the best money spent so I can avoid the drudgery of party prep and concentrate on the fun stuff. 🙂

Still to do…

Design & print the inside walls on frosting sheets for the wallpaper only, leaving the raw gingerbread for brown piping as dark wood wainscoting. Since I’m printing anyway, I’ll print wood flooring (already found good clip art to tile into large sections), some portraits directly on the walls, and Lord Byron’s big bookcase I photographed last fall. 😉 All of those will be accent-piped for 3D detail for frames and furniture edges.

Roll out black modeling chocolate for shingles & window trim – shingles won’t go on until after assembly anyway so the roof can be completely stable before adding extra weight.

Figure out exactly how I can put other food on the gingerbread table. This is getting tricky! For the large enough yard to include all the gravestones & the jack o’lantern walkway, I won’t be able to rotate the house, so it’ll have to be at an angle so people can walk around to see the inside rooms.

Assemble the haunted house! Extra hands scheduled from 5-7pm Thursday for this task! 🙂

Decorate outside! Both secret projects are outside, plus pirate corner, ruins & gravestones will go out on Friday & be tested with fog machines & lighting. Some touchup is usually required for the gravestones from being in storage all year.

Set up the lab! I can’t do too much setup on the tables before the library walls go up, otherwise I’m in danger of knocking over lab glassware. Since the walls are only paper and it gets moist at night, I don’t want them up too many days since they can get soggy, so they will go up on Friday, after the housecleaners vacuum both patios for me & clean the rest of the house!

Final party food! Donut Be Scared Peekaboo Pumpkins, Bizarre Brain Pate, Haunted Human Heart, Eerie Eyeballs, Vicious Veggies, Ferocious Fruit, Freshly Flayed Flesh, are all coming in the next couple days, plus the freezer prep will need rebaking the morning of party day.

Print & cut voting ballots, including Ghoulish Gingerbread quiz sheet!

Set out the owls for Ogle the Owl – have a couple new owls so I’ll need to pay attention to how many, plus retire a couple from rotation.

Set up the outside food table! Since my patio couch is facing the pipe organ, and the forecast is decent, I’m putting the Creepy Cuisine table out on the brick patio, complete with extra lighting so people can see well enough. This will probably help the witch cauldron lemonade get more traffic by the shed. I might put the skull fountain out there too since the lab is cramped with the love seat in there now, but it needs power for the fountain. We’ll see what I figure out. At least I finally fixed the pinhole leak in that cauldron!

Hope you are thoroughly enjoying your Halloween season! I’ll let you all know how the party goes with complete photos! 😀