Monday, August 27, 2012

Hurricane Prep Looks A Lot Like...

Zombie preparation.

Boarded up windows... so the brain hungry buggers can't get in or, in this case, to protect from hurricane projectiles...you know, trees, branches, lawn furniture, etc.


Stock piles of food, a generator, weapons and alcohol...??? Well, maybe only in New Orleans ;P lol
These are my parent's preparations.  They're a lot better at it than we are :)  Thankfully, they live right down the street.  So, if any zombies, I mean, the hurricane comes our way, we'll scamper on over to their place :)

Keep your Haunty stuff safe Southern Haunters, 
-The Countess

Friday, August 24, 2012

Happy Face

Since the weather is gloomy...

I bought something to make me smile :)  Found him at Marshall's.  $6.99 :)


Hope you all have grins on your faces today... It is Friday afterall :)  Maybe this could be a new Friday thing... Halloween grins ;)  I like it.

And if you're currently residing in a Gulf Coast state, please be safe through Tropical Storm Isaac.

-Happy Haunting
The Countess


Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Zombies on the Brrraaaaiiinnnn..

Zombies have been quickly gaining increasing popularity over the past couple of years. So much so, that the zombie craze seems to be entering somewhat of an obsession or paranoia phase in our society. 

The zombie obsession can be seen in the emergence of zombie movies, such as Zombieland, Resident Evil 1,2,3 and a proposed 4 and I am Legend, as well as mainstream  television shows.  The Walking Dead for instance, is heading into its 3rd season, with gaining popularity. But what happens when watching the action on television isn’t enough? What happens when you want to test your own endurance against the infected brain-crazed living dead?  You enter a zombie race.

RUN FOR YOUR LIVES   is a type of capture the flag, meets warrior dash with zombies.  Participants run and endure a grueling series of obstacles (my personal favorite in the promotional video is the tank of blood colored water), all the while, trying to keep their flags from the greedy hands of waiting zombies.  Now I have to say, I don’t know what would be more fun, the adrenaline rush of running from zombies or signing up as a zombie volunteer J Check out the website for the list of towns that RUN FOR YOUR LIVES  will be visiting.
 
If running a 5K race isn’t your thing, but you’d still like to be immersed in a zombie infested Apocalyptic world experience, you could always try Atlanta’s new haunt type of attraction, the Atlanta Zombie Apocalypse.  There are two ways to play, the first option is being lead through a course, the length of 3 city blocks, by “ex-military Zombie fighters”.  From reading the description of the course, which mentions climbing stairs, running, zombies, gore and gunfire, it seems that this attraction has the potential to be an intense experience.
The other option is participating in the Zombie Shoot Course, where paintball guns are provided for shooting "live un-dead zombies".
Opening day is set for September 30th of this year.

In the midst of all the zombie fun, there is also the paranoia of the end of the world, sparked by the other currently popular 2012 headliner, the Mayan calendar.  Since zombies and the end of the world seem to go hand and hand, it’s no wonder that people are getting jumpy about all of the media stories about people displaying “zombie-like” behavior.
The first story to break was that of Ronald Poppo who was viciously attacked by a man, who proceeded to chew on Poppo’s face.  The news report states that when confronted by law enforcement, the attacker growled at them, then continued to chew on Poppo. It was determined that “bath salts”, which were taken as a drug were the cause for the attacker’s bizarre behavior, not the fabled zombie virus. 
  
Other stories of people biting and eating pieces of fellow humans cropped up in the weeks that followed, causing so much of a fuss that Center for Disease Control actually issued a statement to the Huffington Post denying the existence of zombies. 

Even though the Center for Disease Control and Prevention declared that zombies and the zombie virus does not exist, they have certainly recognized that the zombie craze is alive and a great marketing tool.  They have used the zombie popularity to their advantage by launching their campaign, Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse.  This campaign uses the obsession of preparing for a zombie apocalypse as a jumping board to educate the public about being prepared for actual natural disasters.  Amusingly enough, the preparations that some extremists have taken for the zombie apocalypse, such as finding shelter, hoarding weeks supplies of food and water, as well as stocking up on flashlights and batteries, are the same exact preparations that people should take for actual disasters.  I think that the CDC is insanely clever and has shown their great sense of humor by using this advertising technique to their advantage.   

The Center for Disease Control is not the only one capitalizing on the zombie obsession.  Realtor.com devoted a blog entry to 16 pieces of Zombie proof real estate:Sixteen Fortresses for Staving-off the Zombie Apocalypse

Of course, you could always go the way of the old saying, “If you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em!” by participating in a Zombie walk/crawl/parade/etc.  Zombie Walks & Parades, are organized to raise awareness about anything from world hunger to the opening of movies, to raising money for specific foundations: Zombie Walks

But, if you’re just looking to aimlessly shamble down the street in your finest zombie attire, and drink till you forget that you actually have a brain, then a zombie pub-crawl is the way to go.  Events with specific routes to popular bars in whatever town the crawl is going to take place in, are mapped out.  Participants are invited to come along, as long as they come as their zombie self.  Some that I have seen, ask the participants to really get into their characters by creating a back story, through their costume choice about where they were and what they were doing when they were infected by the zombie virus.  

There's no denying it, our society loves zombies, which is great for Halloween enthusiasts! It just gives us more opportunities to do what we love best, with larger groups of people.

Oh and don't forget...


Happy Haunting!

-The Countess



Monday, August 20, 2012

Project Jumble

It seems that my focus is all over the place with my projects this year.  So, here's what I've been up to:

Designing a new winged skull for the new cemetery sign.  I'm using a lovely skull mold that I got from the Davis Graveyard Etsy store:

 This is just a cardboard pattern.  I'll make the wings like the ones for the reaper.  I can't seem to get away from making wings this year!
I've also started tombstone work.  I've been researching different tombstone shapes.  My first 3 homemade stones all look very similar, but that's going to change this year.  This one is going to be Christina Rossetti's.  I'm also working on one for Bram Stoker... but I'm not satisfied with what I've done with it yet, so no picture this time ;)

My newest Halloween obsession this year, sillouettes.  I don't know why.  I think they're great!  They're also easy... which is a nice break from cutting foam.  I couldn't believe how easily the X-acto knife cut through the paper.  Here's the first one that I've completed.  It's just scrapbook paper from Michael's :)  Pretty cheap project too!


That's it for now.  I'm trying to inspire the Count to help me get to work on the Raven Reaper's body, so that I can start on hands and a robe. 

More soon!

Monday, August 6, 2012

It's a Good Thing...

One of my friends refers to me as the Martha Stewart of Halloween. I've got to say, Martha's projects are a lot simpler than mine and they look fantastic, which makes me wonder if I'm trying too hard? LOL, age old adage, "Don't over think it".  I guess that's why I love Martha. 

I'm in love with this Martha project that I spotted on Pinterest:

All of the instructions can be found here
I've all ready printed out my templates :)  I can't wait to do this simple, but beautiful project!  Oh and I'm all ready thinking about other sillouetts that I could make on my own.  Maybe a bat or spider?  The possibilities are endless :)

Happy (simple) Haunting!

Bloody Baking...

I love creative Halloween foods.

This would be perfect for a zombie themed party.

Check them out here

Thursday, August 2, 2012

Changes

Spruced up the blog a little.

I hope you all like it :)

What Does Halloween Smell Like?

I'm seeing a lot of posts in the bloggy world right now about Halloween scented candles.  Some bloggers are lamenting that none of the candle companies have gotten it quite right. Everyone is talking about wanting candles that smell like Halloween night, which made me wonder what Halloween actually smells like to everyone.  I'm sure that there is a huge array of opinions of what Halloween smells like.  It all boils down to the traditions that people have for Halloween and where they are located.

I find that my idea of what Halloween smells like is very much demographically driven :) For me, Halloween smells like sweet, earthy piles of decomposing magnolia leaves, magnolia flower petals and magnolia seed pods.  Especially the seed pods.  They are very odd looking things, that just seem to belong to the fall/Halloween season and the actual seeds in them emit a very distinct scent when they are crushed.


I remember stepping on the red squishy things when I was younger, just so that I could get a strong whiff of that scent. I also remember stepping on the spiny pods themselves, which was not pleasant in any kind of way... I also remember my brother and his friends using them as weapons... oh how diverse the uses for these things were!

But I digress, I really miss that scent.  I live further north of where I used to live, pre-hurricane Katrina, and there aren't very many magnolia trees at all.

The other Halloween scent that I distinctly remember is that of all the old paper decorations that my dad would pull out of the attic every year.  It also had a very distinct smell, almost like a library.  I remember opening up the old, taped and re taped boxes and inhaling the scent of the contents deeply. The smell was an aromatic memory trigger, just waiting bring back images of past Halloweens :)

Now, Halloween smells like clove candles and paint and Froggy's fog in "Gothic" scent :)  It's a nice new heady combination.  But, if a candle company could ever recreated those magnolia scents, I'd go broke buying as many as I could :)

So, what does Halloween smell like to you?  I'm very interested to hear everyone's responses :)

Happy Haunting!