C.R.A.P. Files 005

Next in the bins of “Collectibles Retained and Packed” (C.R.A.P.) are those little hanging ghosts and skeletons you find everywhere during the month of October.

These guys can be found in K-mart, Dollar Stores, Walgreens and just about everywhere that sells Halloween merchandise, they come with elastic string so you can hang them…not sure where you hang them but they are ”hangable.”

Some are really cheap and awful and some are pretty well designed.

Not sure why I like these other than the fact that they are inexpensive and readily available.

Halloween wouldn’t be Halloween without cheap plastic C.R.A.P. hanging around.

Mediocre crap but I still like.

C .R.A.P. Files 004

Seeing it’s now cold outside I thought it would be a good time to resume rummaging through my many bins of “Collectibles Retained and Packed” or CRAP and see what I could find.

This first thing out of the bin was 16 McDonald’s Happy Meal toys called Stretch Screamers released October 3 through the 30^th in 2003.

According to an online source there were originally eight different monsters available although two were recalled.

The monsters featured mechanical sound, light, liquid or rotating movement. These were pretty cool for Happy Meal toys.

My personal favorite is the mummy which changed faces when the arm was pulled and the mad scientist sporting a squishy expanding brain.

This is good crap.

Etsy Skulls

Added six large new skulls to my Etsy store.

Three winged skulls and three horned warrior skulls.

Just in time for Black Friday.

Etsy Pumpkins

Added some new pumpkins to my Etsy store.

Three tortured pumpkins and three Jack O'Lanterns.

Just in time for Black Friday!

Missed Again

Since 1992 we have made it a tradition to take a family photo in front of our Halloween decorations.

Last year we completely forgot and this year didn’t remember until about five minutes before it was shut down for the season.

The result as you will see is a crappy cell phone photo.

In years past we typically try for the “golden hour” photo…those moments before the sun sets and everything is warm and washed in golden light.

Something like this:

This year is the “grainy hour”….those moments when the cell phone flash goes off and everything is craptastic and washed out from the flash.

Something like this:

Next year.

We All Fall Down

My wife snapped this picture of the zombies sitting in the yard waiting to be assembled…don’t know why but I sort of like this picture…especially the heads…they look like they are popping out of the ground.

Bite Me

Created by Oatmeal

Sweet Tooth

Stumbled across this pretty cool pumpkin covered with ten bags of candy corn, here’s the info:

Presenting the amazing Candy Corn Pumpkin!
The pumpkin pictures shown are from loyal Brach's Candy customers Brenda Young, Janet Colman, and Ginny Thawley from The Eastern Shore of Maryland, USA (Ridgely, Henderson and Greensboro). With 8 hours of craft time, 10 bags of Brach's candy corn, straight pins, and some creative genius, this group of candy lovers designed a candy corn masterpiece!

Here’s the link.

Spider Wrangling

My wife snapped this picture while I was hanging three spiders in our front tree.

She was concerned that they were high enough so nobody would hit them while walking underneath although we shared different points of view.

She was concerned somebody would get poked in the eye with one of the legs.

I was concerned that somebody would break one of the legs with their eye.

We work well together.

More Goofiness From 2009

Found these photos from 2009 during a visit to Kmart and Spirit stores trying on masks…why the heck are we taking all these photos?

Easy.

Try on the mask and someone snaps a shot with the cell phone then you can see how you look in the mask…a whole lot better than a mirror which most stores don’t have in the mask section.

Go figure.

That's me in the werewolf mask looking dapper.

Year In Review:2010

Well it's November and everything is packed away so I took a moment to look back on the props made for the 2010 haunting season.

The Year In Review

GLFF 2010 Random Photos

Grabbed a bunch of photos my wife has taken with her cell phone....lots of Halloween images from the past 18 months.

Here are some photos from Great Lakes FrightFest held last June...the best one is my oldest son sitting in a camp chair...gasp...he's actually smiling.

Goofing Around....

...at the Spirit store and Halloween City.

In mid October we took a trip to check out some of the Halloween merchandise available for 2010 and found ourselves trying on a variety of masks.

That's me in the first picture with the baseball cap and chomping a stogie...sadly the mask didn’t really make much of a difference.

This was a fun day.