So, where to start

I think I will go back to front. I have always been a bit odd....so this works for me.

Last weekend was a blast, as most of you know we attended the first annual West Coast Haunters Convention, we had a great time.....but I am going to skip to the end. (I promise to get back to the very interesting beginning later.)

Our friends Leonard and Jeanne Pickel who stayed in town for an extra day and graced us with their awesome presence.

For those of you not familiar with them, they put on HAuNTcon, Leonard (founder) is the editor of Haunted Attraction Magazine, Leonard has owned and designed many haunted attractions (owns D.O.A.), he is an icon in the industry.


Beside all that.....they are both really cool people.

I know I have gushed on them before, but they really deserve it. In the years that Husband and I have been more and more involved in the greater haunt community we have made a lot of great friends, but have found not one more supportive of home haunters in the haunt industry then Leonard (and HAuNTcon.)

Proving again how much he appreciates home haunters he took the extra day while he was in town to hang with Husband and I. (Could be lack of haunts in our area...but we like to think it was us.)




We got to show them our yard and all our stuff (looks a lot less impressive in storage :D ) He was very kind and helpful, answering questions and offering suggestions. How many home haunters get to spend that much time with people that are so knowledgeable about haunting...most people pay for that kind of time.....oops, I didn't ask if the meter is running......I might be getting a bill in the mail :D (It was so worth it!)

One of my favorite moments is when he was looking at our pictures and said "so how do the corpses in the trees fit in the display?" I stammered with how they fit in the back story about how the monk tortured and killed the towns folk. I had to smile, because those particular props gave me the same problem when I started "house cleaning" the yard a few years ago. To tell the truth, I had to stretch the back story to fit the prop. I thought no one would notice...damn he is good. That is why he is who he is...yes, even the frog queen bows down to that much awesomeness! :D



He also reminded me that he volunteered to write the forward for our book....the one we have been talking about writing for about 5 years now :D (I would say it is half way done....as one haunter friend reminded me lately....I need to prioritize! - I am starting to think there is a conspiracy going on to finally get us off our behinds!!! :D )

We talked about what more we could do at HAuNTcon and husband and I have been seriously talking about getting involved on a larger scale. (Larger for us, small for HAuNTcon overall.) But if it all works out, could be fun and a learning experience. We have some budgeting issues to work out on our end....but those are just details. He thought we would talk about it more on our road trip this weekend and get back to him next week.

Just have to say thank you once again to some of the coolest people in the haunt community.

BTW, if we are more involved.......you are all going to HAuNTcon to support us next year.....right? :D

Even if I had

another sister-in-law. She would still be my favorite.

This is a gift from Husband's sister - she works at a custom glass company. This was one of the left overs from a project.

For the record, nothing this cool is ever in the free pile at my work :D

We are still working on exactly what to do with it. I is currently decorating the coffee table....

I mean where else do you put something this awesome :D

Off to build a shrine to its magnificence. ;D

Husband is just

the coolest guy. He gets to work on a project with Mike Richardson!!!

(excuse the frog queen as she geeks out here for a moment :D )

So, when we are not spending all our time working the Halloween thing, he is chairman of the Milwaukie Art Committee here is our small town of Milwaukie. Which almost no one has ever heard of, unless you are a comic book collector....then you know exactly where we are. :)

Milwaukie's claim to fame is that it is the home of Dark Horse Comics. (Recently paired up with Bruce Campbell for the "My Name is Bruce" movie) Mike Richardson is the founder and is originally from Milwaukie, so he created the world headquarters of Dark Horse comics in Milwaukie.

Mike has been in the business forever and knows everyone, in this time he has managed to amass a very large collection of comic book art. How cool huh? And cooler still he has agreed to allow the art committee (ArtMOB) to host a show of his collection "Hometown Superhero" with the proceeds going to the committee.

Seriously nice guy!

The show is the 18th - 23rd of June with a special VIP night on Saturday (get your tickets here). Mike will give talk about his career and then provide a personal tour of his collection. There will be music and wine and cheese (from our favorite wine place Wine:30) and the opportunity to meet Mike and let him know how wonderful you think he is....well at least I will :)

Looking forward to this event...but it is keeping us both a bit busy...so hang on - I will be back to blogging soon!

If you are in the area, buy tickets for the VIP night, Husband I and will be there!

Stop what you

are doing and head over the ShellHawk's blog. She posted a video that she took at the West Coast Haunters Convention - I guarantee you, you have not seen anything like this before....priceless :)

Looks like all the fun at the convention happened during our class :D Sorry we missed it but oh so glad she got it on video!!!

Not dead yet

just a little distracted this last week. It was a good distraction, more info to follow!

Hummm, now I have that song from Spamalot stuck in my head



Now you will too :D

It has been a while

since I bashed (I mean reviewed) a movie on this site, so imagine my surprise when Andrew at Who Wants Taters??? let me know that I was listed on Total Film site as a blog that does horror reviews.

600 movie bloggers you may have missed (scroll down I am towards the bottom)

For only doing a handful of reviews....that is pretty cool huh?

It is not that I don't watch horror films and want to talk about them, I do, but there are so many very talented, clever and funny bloggers out there that do an excellent job a horror movie review. Each time I think I will put my two cents in, I read on of their unique and entertaining posts and think....yeah, I am soooo not qualified to play in that arena.

I often find after reading most peoples reviews, more often than not find I have the opposite opinion....which just further proves I have business entering that world. Case in point that I seem to be the only person on the planet (or part of a very, very small group) that thought Paranormal Activity was a waste of ......

I think I will stick to Halloween decorations.

We all know

I love the kitties so when Becca at Magikal Seasons (and co blogger on the Haunted Gardens blog) had created her cat ornaments, I knew I had to have them. She made three with different faces, I put one on the wall in my cat hallway, and the other two I am going to put in my door prize box for our Halloween party.

She makes all kinds of whimsical ornaments to choose from at her Etsy store, her candy corn and skull ones are other favorites of mine. So in honor of my latest Etsy purchase, I am changing out the Etsy store link at the right to her site. Check it out when you get a chance.

I knew I heard scratching

coming from the walls.







Poor basement cat, if he only watched South Park, he could have saved himself the trip to my house.....he would have known that us gingers have no souls :D

The most popular

class choices from our survey were, in order:

Molding and casting
corpsifying
tombstones
video effects
graveyard overview

We looked at our schedule and just could not find enough weekends to fit all those in and make stuff of the yard for this year. So the top three classes were the winners. We have a complete schedule on our website. If you are in the area, we would love to have you stop by and join us.

When we heard that Ed from Nightmare Factory haunt at the Oregon School for the Deaf was going to host the first West Coast Haunters Convention and he needed speakers, we had found the solution for the other two classes.


So, we were able to add our Video Effects and Graveyard Overview classes, you just have to drive to Salem, about an hour away from Portland.


So, Husband and I offering two classes at the convention next weekend. The first one is the whirlwind "How to Build a Better Cemetery" presentation....where we run through the whole yard process in about an hour. We did this presentation a few years ago a Hauntcon in Detroit and it was great fun. We get asked about it often.

The second class is the "Video Effects" class. Here we teach you how we make all of our projection ghost effects. This is also a really popular class at Hauntcon and the process was also featured in Haunted Attraction Magazine a few years back.

So right now I am in the process of dusting off and updating both of those presentations for the convention as well as a few other things for the event. So, I apologize that I am a bit lax on my blog entries :)

I keep telling myself

that this really deserves a better picture before I post it. But it has been almost two weeks and I have not been able to get the time to take another picture, so here it is.

Another frog on the pumpkin, courtesy of my blog buddy ShellHawk. She sent it up with Ghoul Friday when she came to stay a few weeks ago.... Isn't she nice :)

(It is not actually one piece...it is a lovely glass frog that I put on top of one of her fantastic ceramic pumpkins...I mean where else was it going to go. :D )

I have been getting all kinds of nice presents from my Halloween friends. I have started sending out gifts to random friends....just to keep the good karma working :D

BTW - so sorry I have been slacking on the blog....very busy at work and at home. I promise in a few weeks I will be back to my normal "insane amount of posts a day" self.

I will say it again

the basement cat ones crack me up!!


see more Lolcats and funny pictures

So let us just get this

one out of the way, once and for all.

I have been musing on how funny you all think it is to send me spider stuff - ha, ha, very funny....I am glad everyone is having a good time :D

Actually as much as I am afraid of them, they are quite interesting and in the last few years since I have been blogging you have all helped me learn more about spiders than I EVER wanted to know. Thanks...I think.

I think some of you go out there and just search for stuff to scare me, and I appreciate your dedication, especially several bloggers who have told me about the worlds largest spider......and since I have never posted about it, you all must think I don't know about it....trust me.

I know.

I think the first person to bring the Goliath Bird Eating Spider to my attention was my friend Mr. Macabre. (At least I think he is my friend.....he says he is.....:D) But several of you kind bloggers have also been thoughtful enough to draw it to my attention....which by the way is not needed......this frickin spider is HUGE, how could you miss it.

So, I am going to post a picture of this monster (and I mean monster) on my blog.....so stop sending me links to pictures and videos......at least until I get a home defibrillator :)






And for a really funny read about this spider (cause we can only laugh in the face of fear), check out this link. I so wish I had written this.

"You know that Halloween...."

is over right?" Says (my favorite Halloween hating) co-worker.

Now, to be honest, when ever she stops by I get defensive, because she usually makes a point about saying something negative about my love of Halloween. I need to work on being more open to her comments, like a normal rational adult. :D

Man, I crack myself up sometimes. Anyway.....

Unfortunately, my mouth cop died a long time ago...and since I work in a very conservative place, I had to bring in hired security, the last one quit without notice, so I have this new guy, this was his chance to show me what he could do.....he rose the the challenge, he was on the spot and stepped up in time to help me politely say, without any sarcasm.

"Oh, really?"

Instead of "Are you just trying to annoy me today? Do I have to explain again that for me it is always Halloween and if you are going to comment on my Halloween frog theme....well, just......." which was what was going through my head

"Yeah, all your frogs on this shelf are Halloween related. I thought you changed them out for the season?"

She proceeds to open up my cabinet and point to all the cute frogs with Santa hats, holding hearts and bunny ears.

(I keep them safe in the dark where they will not harm anyone...you have to be careful of the cute ones!)

My mouth cop slacked a bit and I was able to say with a great amount of sarcasm "Oh, no, it looks like I missed those holidays....poor frogs, they did not get out of the cabinet all year!"

Instead of "Would you quit going through my stuff? And, it was not an accident. I tend to like Halloween and I leave those up all year....and if I remember, I will get out the other ones, but I tend to be very forgetful when it comes to that stuff.....I am too busy working....you know what you should be doing right now." :D

She chuckles, I can see she is not sure if I am kidding or not. She makes a cute pouty face and says "Well, can just stop by and remind you if that would help!"

In my head I start to hear the screaming. Hired mouth cop gets scared and starts to run, he heard the story of what happened to his predecessor. But I grab him by the neck and put him back in place - you are not going anywhere buddy, you got work to do! He stops shaking for a moment and we manage to say

"That would be great! Thanks so much!"

Instead of "Please take your Halloween hating self and go away.....now.....that would be safer for both of us."

At this point I think my hired mouth cop is crying, mumbling something about no one warned him....

I have to admit I feel a bit sorry for him. Maybe I should buy him a beer :)

BTW - Not in the best mood (can you tell :D) very busy at work these days and do not need this stuff!!!

On a side note

does anyone know how to post comments on The Land of Always October's blog?

He has a great blog and is featured on my fellow blogger Cat in the Pumpkin Moon/Cat in the Moon who is doing an interesting Halloween blog crawl feature all month on both her blogs.

I have been trying for months and nothing works, even opened the blog in 4 different browsers. He has a great blog, but I noticed no comments.* I sent him a couple emails, but since he does not follow this blog...he might not know who I am or....he does and then that means he is avoiding me - can't say I blame him :D I try to avoid me as much as possible :)

Anyway, if any of you bloggers know him, can you get him a message that something is up with his site so we can all tell him how much we love his blog? :)

Okay, back to prop building....and my new favorite pass time.....scaring myself with spiders :D**

* Unless there is a way to hide comments from a blogger and I just can't see them and you all can....well, then never mind, and boy do I feel awkward :)

**BTW- that was NOT , I repeat N-O-T, an invitation to send me more spider stuff....really people, you can all stop now :)

Sometimes the research

comes to you....by the way of a fellow blogger in NJ who was featuring some abandoned places in his neck of the woods. One of them turns out be to a super sweet location called the Gingerbread Castle. It was originally part of a kids theme park that turn into a haunted walk thru in its later years.

It is definitely abandoned now and in much disrepair...which as he put it, just makes it extra creepy.

Thanks Ghoulish Cop at The Devil's Eye blog for letting me repost this information. Great blog and haunt check it out when you get a chance.

Things the Frog Queen does not need to know - Part 1

That there is actually a spider called a Pumpkin Spider. (Thanks to frothie51 at Percy The Black Cat blog for the link with the pictures....I think it is thanks I am feeling...could be...)
























Right now, all I am thinking is that I hope these are named after their shape and color, it would be tragic if they are named "pumpkin" spiders because they are common in pumpkin patches.

Because if the latter be the case, then the frog queen has seen her last pumpkin patch :D

It is either

the scariest or coolest pumpkin ever.

Or both....actually I am going to go with both :)

Got zombie

parts?


I got zombie parts.....I have the head and hand of a very small zombie!!! Yes, one of my blog friends is dismembering innocent zombies for jewerly!

I know what you are thinking....

.....is that cool or what?


Actually they are likely made of plastic or clay.....but I prefer the idea that she has coraled up an army of small zombie and is keeping them in her basement and harvesting thier parts for her evil plans and profit. I am not saying that she is hacking up innocent zombies, I bet she waits for the parts to fall off naturally....you know, like they do sometimes. :D

I have had the pleasure of meeting her (and Andy) and I think the small zombie farm (although highly unpausible) is definately something she is capable of :) That is why I like her :)

Thanks for visiting Ghoul Friday - it was a please to meet you (both of you!) You are welcome at the Graveyard anytime.

Just bring more zombie parts!!!