Thread: Hello from South West MO.

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As you know Im a newbie here but been a fan of halloween forever.. I grew up on the west coast and made many visits to Knotts Scarry Farm as a wee lad and I have lived in MO for about 15 years now. After moving out here and seeing the small spook houses, we started a little hay ride for the kids. After doing the hay ride for a couple of years we set up a little round bale maze and the kids enjoyed it more than the hay ride and it allways seemed to rain on the hay ride night so we moved the maze indoors... We have two 400 ft. retired chicken houses that we use for hay storage. The first year we used half of one of the houses and had about 40 kids show up and loved it. The next year we made it bigger and we had about 200 kids and parents show up.

This will be year number 8 I think and it is done all out of pocket and no profit is being made. As the kids get older, the scare has to be better so that's allways an issue when it comes to funds. Im pretty handy with tools and building my owne props so that helps a lot. I tried a donation jar but Im lucky to make twenty bucks. We only do this one night so I don't expect the donations to be much. What ever donations we get go back into black lights and so on....

This year I had decided not to do it because it's not exactly easy setting everthing up and it's allmost impossible to get parents to help. As soon as school started the kids starting asking so naturally I gave in. The couple that do help realize how much work goes into and are allways there for me so that's cool. Parents don't realize how much thought goes into what we do becuase hay in a building with electricity can turn bad if not controled. We run on minimum electricity so trying to make a good effect takes some serious thought and effort. The local fire department allways sends a truck down with a few guys for saftey and I get them to do a walk through to check our power locations . That's the good thing about the chicken house is the many recepticals and they are up to code even the houses are retired.

Anyway that's what Im about and hopefully I can learn some new tricks from you guys if you don't mind sharing ideas.....

~~ Welcome ~~

hello!! we love to share and steal ideas lol. lots to learn here. good luck with haunt.

Hello Sientbob2 !
As many times as I have been to Cali. I've never got the chance to see Knott's Berry Farms Halloween Knott's Scary Farm set up, or Disney Land's, or Universal's. I've been to all of them many- many times, but knot during Halloween. I'd love to see them sometime, but that's kind of hard to do when you set up for Halloween and the whole nieghborhood relies on you to do so, and so does all of the kids. Everybody starts asking about two weeks ahead of time, when are you going to start setting up? I just tell them real soon now.
Well you're going to like it here. Have a great time.

Hello and Welcome to the forum Silentbob2. We love to share our ideas here. We also love to see pictures too. So jump right in and let's make it fun for the ToTs!

I will sart taking some pics and posting soon. As of right now our props are setup around black light effects because it's simple and the kids can't get enough. Im trying to move toward a little more graphic props because most of the kids that attend are now at the middle school level.

Thanks for the welcome.

Hello Silentbob2 ! Wow you are truely one of us from the start! thank you for keeping the Halloween spirit alive.......sorry that the parents around you don't support ( with help and $)
but you do know what fantastic memories and example you are setting up for those TOT"S .
Since some of the kids are getting older....hee hee....they could become your helpers, or actors at the very least. Well, like naberhoodhaunts said .....we have and steal ( lol) ideas around here. Warning : this forum is very addicting. So becareful you don't miss Halloween ! I am sure we'll see each other around ! Welcome !

Welcome!