Joined
·
5,851 Posts
Some of you may remember from last year, but a lot of you are new since then as well.
The Laboratory project of mine has a very special place in my heart.
The concept was the first one I ever tried to re-create on my front porch...when I was 9.
I had a cardboard cutout of a skeleton, a friend to play frankenstein, a little lighting ball thing, and one of those "blacklight" bulbs you can sometimes buy in the stores.
The "blacklight" amounted to a purple lightbulb, my friend ditched me, and in all senses of the word, the thing SUCKED. Such was my first experience with haunting. And, I had never really gone back to doing a lab setup.
Last year, I was approached by my mother-in-law to help with their school's Halloween Carnival. To set up a "little spook alley". This is a rather important fund raiser for this particular school, and I was happy to help. Each teacher gets to keep the cash their room makes, and I was sure we would do well.
I got out my book of concepts (I still am using), and showed her the lab, and a witch concept. Both would be relatively simple for me to make in the 20 days I had that year.
She liked the lab.
(original sketches of the idea)
![]()
I was excited to get back to that first haunt. But, with 20 days to build something, it was fun, and unlike some 25 years ago, it WORKED this time, if it was a bit underwhelming.
So, I set out to make it RIGHT this year.
Then...things started to unravel.
The school moved away from a Halloween Carnival to a "FALL Carnival" and moved it up from October to last night.
That's ok, I thought, most of it was done, I'll just have to skip a couple things.
This carnival was SUPPOSED to be outside. So, we had arranged to have a classroom near the activities, no biggie.
Then, the weather kicked in. The Carnival was going to be rained out. Knowing this in advance, we asked the plan, and were told to set up in room A. Now, room A was seperate from the main school, and, Monday morning, BEFORE the rain, I set everything up in there, ready to go, all tested.
At 3:15 PM, we were told to move it to Room B.
Now raining, I had to clean out room B, haul all this stuff across the parking lot, and set up.
In the process, we lost the jacob's ladder and a flicker circuit to the rain. (I'm hoping the ladder will work again when it's all dried out) Rushing to set up, we also tipped over one of my lamps and busted it. Will be easy to fix, and I had a spare bulb, so minimal loss other than cleaning up the glass.
Then, we lost a light bulb in the move I did not have a replacement for.
And, to make it all the worse, now soaking wet, you could forget about getting me in makeup in time for the 5PM start. We TRIED the bald cap, but it come off an hour in, hair too wet, and we just mashed makeup into my hair and kept going.
Just about everything went wrong...
THAT SAID. A lot of fun. Last year's lab set a record at the school for a single room, raising just over $80. (at $0.25 a person, that's not bad for 3 hours)
We shattered that record this year with well over $100.
So, without further ado.
The '09 laboratory. Just before we gave up on the bald cap. Big mean man makes girl cry....
(That's my daughter in the back calling out for daddy and yelling hi Bob at Bob on the table.)
Another angle just after the removal of the bald cap. Big mean man makes adult with camera scream...
The Laboratory project of mine has a very special place in my heart.
The concept was the first one I ever tried to re-create on my front porch...when I was 9.
I had a cardboard cutout of a skeleton, a friend to play frankenstein, a little lighting ball thing, and one of those "blacklight" bulbs you can sometimes buy in the stores.
The "blacklight" amounted to a purple lightbulb, my friend ditched me, and in all senses of the word, the thing SUCKED. Such was my first experience with haunting. And, I had never really gone back to doing a lab setup.
Last year, I was approached by my mother-in-law to help with their school's Halloween Carnival. To set up a "little spook alley". This is a rather important fund raiser for this particular school, and I was happy to help. Each teacher gets to keep the cash their room makes, and I was sure we would do well.
I got out my book of concepts (I still am using), and showed her the lab, and a witch concept. Both would be relatively simple for me to make in the 20 days I had that year.
She liked the lab.
(original sketches of the idea)
I was excited to get back to that first haunt. But, with 20 days to build something, it was fun, and unlike some 25 years ago, it WORKED this time, if it was a bit underwhelming.
So, I set out to make it RIGHT this year.
Then...things started to unravel.
The school moved away from a Halloween Carnival to a "FALL Carnival" and moved it up from October to last night.
That's ok, I thought, most of it was done, I'll just have to skip a couple things.
This carnival was SUPPOSED to be outside. So, we had arranged to have a classroom near the activities, no biggie.
Then, the weather kicked in. The Carnival was going to be rained out. Knowing this in advance, we asked the plan, and were told to set up in room A. Now, room A was seperate from the main school, and, Monday morning, BEFORE the rain, I set everything up in there, ready to go, all tested.
At 3:15 PM, we were told to move it to Room B.
Now raining, I had to clean out room B, haul all this stuff across the parking lot, and set up. In the process, we lost the jacob's ladder and a flicker circuit to the rain. (I'm hoping the ladder will work again when it's all dried out) Rushing to set up, we also tipped over one of my lamps and busted it. Will be easy to fix, and I had a spare bulb, so minimal loss other than cleaning up the glass.
Then, we lost a light bulb in the move I did not have a replacement for.
And, to make it all the worse, now soaking wet, you could forget about getting me in makeup in time for the 5PM start. We TRIED the bald cap, but it come off an hour in, hair too wet, and we just mashed makeup into my hair and kept going.
Just about everything went wrong...
THAT SAID. A lot of fun. Last year's lab set a record at the school for a single room, raising just over $80. (at $0.25 a person, that's not bad for 3 hours)
We shattered that record this year with well over $100.
So, without further ado.
The '09 laboratory. Just before we gave up on the bald cap. Big mean man makes girl cry....
(That's my daughter in the back calling out for daddy and yelling hi Bob at Bob on the table.)
Another angle just after the removal of the bald cap. Big mean man makes adult with camera scream...
