Burelloween Central

Burelloween 2020 - Goodwill Finds

2020-09-19T17:48:00.001-05:00

Out checking out the Spirit Halloween store, they had some ok stuff, but nothing I would spend money on. So we went to the Goodwill store looking for victims and inspiration..

Halfway through the store.... there it was! In all its emerald green glory!

I found it! Its perfect!

My wife Melissa... "its a bowling ball... i don't get it...".

To you it is a bowling ball... to me it is the heart of the pumpkin king! Stay tuned to see how this beautiful, heavy, ball helps bring the pumkin king to life!

Bureloween 2020 - Stuff just got serious!

2020-09-11T16:42:00.001-05:00

Received some goodies today! Taking Halloween to the next level!

A few years ago, I built a little animatronic floating skull prop. and tried to build a few pneumatic scare props. The skull floated up from behind a tombstone and lit up as it went. While the skull worked, it was kind of cheesey and the attempt at pneumatics was a dismal failure and never made it out of the workshop.

This year I am hoping to up my prop game with these beefy windshield wiper motors, which appear to be the standard for animatronic prop builders. I had to do a little redneck engineering in order to have these drive something as big as what I am planning for the pumpkin king. Stay tuned for that build ..... should be interesting....

by the way... anyone know where I can get a bowling ball and a basket full of baby dolls free or super cheap?

.... asking for a friend :-)

Burelloween 2020 - Couples Date Night

2020-09-05T21:23:00.001-05:00

We love Halloween, and we love sharing our parties with all of our friends and family. But it is even better when we have friends that also love making props and decorating. A couple of our dear friends Dave and Laurel Hart came over for a dinner and scarecrow making session.

We had never sculpted burlap scarecrows before, but after a few YouTube videos we were off and running with the creative juices flowing. And for being our first time these are really looking creepy!

Some glue, burlap, twine, and some good friends are all you need for a great evening.

We got the basic sculpts down, just a few more coats of glue and a little paint and these will be ready to marry up to some scarecrow bodies and start guiding people through our haunt!

Burelloween 2020 - Dollar Tree Date Night

2020-09-04T19:41:00.001-05:00

An annual tradition is hitting the local Dollar Tree for Halloween supplies. Since we like to build and embellish everything, there is no point in paying a lot of money for supplies. In years past Dollar Tree has carried some really good stuff, in the last couple of years all of the stores seem to be carrying less and less, and what they do carry is pretty lame.

Never the less, we picked up a lot of skulls, and other things we can use in our prop builds, decorations, games, and even the awards we will be giving out for the costume and food contests. Its pretty cool when you can walk out with a shopping basket of stuff for $50 or less.

Not a bad haul overall.... let the crafting begin!

Burelloween 2020 - Pumpkin King Scribbles

2020-08-23T22:11:00.001-05:00

Spent some time thinking through different designs and possible mechanics for one of the more ambitious props I have attempted.

The scale and the addition of animatronic features I am hoping to incorporate make it pretty challenging.

Hopefully I can achieve the desired effects and still keep the design as simple. Trying to always keep the KISS method in mind, the more complex and over engineered you make something the more that can go wrong.

Murphy always shows up when you are having people over :-)

these are just some iterations of thinking through different ideas and methods I saw other hunters use to build their props.

Burelloween 2020 - Welcome to the Farm

2020-08-13T13:51:00.005-05:00

Weeere Baaaaack!

After a long hiatus of 6 years of adulting and life changes, it is time to have some fun and celebrate one of the most awesome holidays of the year. As many of you know, we have moved to the country, which gives us a more room to play. As is my Modus Operandi, I have big visions for our Haunt and of course the halloween party, With only two months until the witching hour it will be a race to see how much of the vision we can achieve. So come join us on our adventure as we build props, decorate, and plan for the big event.

We have already started.... we have a logo for this years event... and already picked up a few goodies at the discount store....

Burelloween 2014 - The outbreak

2015-09-20T09:59:00.003-05:00

The outbreak begins!

The Zombie Eratication Squad responds!

Uh oh... Man down!

Time to go to work!

Not hard to sneak up on a Zombie when they are eating....

Zombie Crush Level 5!

Uh Oh! Melissa has been turned.....

Ok... Maybe Zombies arent so bad :-)

Burelloween 2014 preparation

2015-09-20T09:41:00.003-05:00

Preparing for the Zombie Hoards, pvc pipe, nylon twine for fencing, and some caution tape

Glow in the dark paint, some old trash cans and recycled barrels, add a few glow sticks and turns into a great effect.

Zombifying the styrofoam heads for our brain eaters. Spray paint, plastic wrap, and a heat gun ...

Zombifying a cheap dollar store skull....

The hoard has eyes!

Zombie eradication squad ... pvc structure, trash bags, dish gloves and some cheap dollar store gas masks! Pvc structure, old clothes, spray paint, and some news paper give the zombies body.

Drop in a victim with some spray foam guts and paint and a zombie response vehicle with a $10 rotating amber light and some zombie hoard sound effects blasting from hidden speakers and some strategic lighting and we done!

It's Coming... Are you prepared?

2014-09-11T13:25:00.003-05:00

Burelloween 2013 - Hunt for the booty

2014-09-11T12:49:00.003-05:00

Halloween 2013 was the year we finally made it to the Pirate theme. Work and travel were a bit hectic so we didnt have time to pull off the full vision, but we did have fun pulling it together!

Captain Skelly seems to have had a bit of
a mishap with his ship

Nothing like a 20 foot mast with a crows nest, and a full sized dingy

Who's that handsome devil.... its me!

Rum and Music

Its not a party until a fight breaks out!

My Precious! so Shiny...

There is always that one guy that gets so drunk...

Blood or wine?

And more fighting...

Everything goes better with fire.

Hic!?!

Woooo! Desigated rower. I think my wires are showing...

Behind the scenes Halloween 2012

2013-09-29T23:08:00.001-05:00

A behind the scenes look at my madness... and this was an "off year" where we only decorated the outside...

Before

Add Heavy Metal and Doom Metal

Add a few building materails

The Gates of Hell started with building a 7'+ ( I wanted a full 10' but didnt have enough scene setters and the pvc wasnt strong enough to handle 10') facade of pvc framing around the entire front of the house. Then covering it with Scene Setters. You can see our hell hound standing guard and "helping"... more like eating the wall !

Wait.. you mean we are going to wrap the WHOLE house?

I think you are missing this piece!

Whatcha doing back there?

Hell hound standing guard

Teamwork fighting the wind and taping from both sides

more tape

Arrgh even with a light breeze the facade is like a sail!

My creative workshop area!

Skeletons Everywhere!

Hanging around waiting to be drilled..

Homage to Tawny Kitane and Whitesnake video!

If I cut open a skull and squirt foam in it ... I can make another skull!

Skull factory!

Sorry... loved that Tawny Kitane...

Even skulls that didnt come out right make great torches!

Punkin on a stick! old costumes never go to waste!

Ah..Snow white you were my first...

Love the rubber barbed wire... looks painful

I think I have something in my eye... hey its pvc!

Ah yes... mood lighting and a welcoming face!

Pretty tame in daylight... still had a lot of cars stop though...

Burelloween 2012 ...Last minute hell....

2013-09-29T22:27:00.001-05:00

So last year I was really gung ho about finally doing the pirate themed Halloween, but having just moved to Dallas TX, and with travel for my job being so erratic, I didnt know if I would have the time to decorate, and if so how much. So once I figured out I would have some time to decorate... you know I had to do something to make an impression on my neighbors. Unfortunately we didnt have much time to prepare, so it was more about masking the house and decorating, than building big props.
We decided to do a "Gates of Hell" theme, in which the kids would need to enter the gates of hell to get their treats.. I built a facade wall of pvc pipe (gotta love pvc!) then used scene setters that we normally use inside, to wrap the entire front and part of the sides of the house. I got a bunch of the cheap blow molded skeletons on sale and used a dremel tool to remove all that extra plastic and a little paint to make them look more realistic. use spray foam and some cheap tiki torches to make the skull torches....

The Entrance to Hell....

Someone who got tangled up in barbed wire.

Another view

Ouch..

That is going to leave a mark..

Must have had anger issues... lots of impaling and contortions...

Yes kids... We use real fire!

This is what happens when you stray from the path..

Through the groin, through the lungs, through the chin... eye see where you are going with this!

18" Skull greeting the guests

Blood fountain

Blood Drinking Fountain...

Silliness...

Punkin on a stick...teach you to call your kid punkin...

The Achilles/Oedipus hang..

Again with the impaling..

Again with the eye...

More Eye shots...

Yes I was waiting in the shadows for you...

And you thought spiderwebs were bad... try barbed wire..

Feel the hate young skywalker...

So the impression wasnt quite what I was expecting.... In California, we had people that were so freaked out by our decorations, that they wouldnt come up to the house. Apparently in Texas... not so scary.. I had hoards of little kids wanting to get their picture taken with the impaled, contorted skeletons!

On to Burelloween 2013!

Burelloween 2012 - Gates of Hell

2012-10-15T12:31:00.002-05:00

After a year of ups and downs including the loss of a couple family members and completely relocating to a different state... it is time to get this blog up and running again. Last years vision of the Pirate Odyssey didn't work out. With family members getting sick and losing them prior to Halloween, we naturally had to focus on what was important. We also took a hard look at where we were, where the economy was going, and where we wanted to be in the future and made the decision to move to a state more conducive to our values and need for economic stability.

Now that the move is done and we have stabilized a bit, we find ourselves two weeks from Halloween without our big props (yes we sold them before moving) and a clean slate on how we are going to make an impression on the new neighborhood. This of course has the juices flowing with a sense of urgency to get it done in time. Given our limited number of friends in the area and the short preparation time, we are not having the traditional Halloween bash, and will just be focusing on the outside of the house and how we can appropriately welcome the kiddies.

The current vision is to borrow from last years unrealized vision of a skull cave but instead of a pirate theme, do more of a burial mound facade. So essentially lots of skulls and skeletons. So while the concept is somewhat simple, it always comes back to can it be done in time.... and the clock starts now!

Burelloween 2011 - A Pirates Odyssey - The Pilgrimage

2011-11-11T16:48:00.004-06:00

It is the beginning of September and everyone is starting to get the Burelloween bug, including my daughter who put together this original sketch for the blog this week.

As the commercialization of Christmas and a weakend economy encourages stores to try to exploit the consumers earlier in the year, the halloween season seems to get shorter and the selection at the traditional discount stores has become more generic and uninspired. Up until about 3 years ago, we were able to find great selections at the typical big box stores like Walmart, Target, and K-Mart, and the prices were low enough to actually be able to buy good props and decorations without breaking the bank.

In an effort to maximize our halloween budget and find interesting pieces to add to our decor, we have found some places to get great deals if you hit them at the right times, thus inspiring a new family tradition for Burelloween. The annual Burelloween pilgrimmage includes a full day of shopping with a route that includes to some places one wouldnt think of for Halloween decor.

The pilgrimmage usually starts with getting the family up early and loaded into the 4runner and a quick stop through a drive through and Starbucks to make sure everyone is fueled up for the trip. The next stop is a 25 mile drive from Temecula, to the Dollar Tree in Vista, Ca.

Yes thats right Dollar Tree! Believe it or not this discount store carries new stuff every year, and while it doesnt carry fancy latex masks and such, it has a lot of great decoration items, skulls, bones, and other pieces and parts to help enhance the environment. In addition, I tend to use a lot of household items like tape, string, zip ties, etc in the builds and with nothing over a buck, I can get all I need, cheap.

One may ask "why drive 25 miles to the Dollar Tree in Vista, Ca when there is one only 5 miles away in Murrietta?" . While the Dollar Tree in Murrietta is also good spot, the answer lies in the fact that this is only the first stop in the route. Located in the same strip mall as the Dollar Tree, is a rather large Goodwill Store. We have found great pieces of clothing and other decorative odds and ends. On this trip in particular, since the theme is pirate odessy, we were able to find some great eclectic pieces for the piles of treasure.

After the Goodwill store, we continued into San Marcos and had lunch at probably the most authentic place to get Philly Cheesesteaks in San Diego County, Philly Franks! If you have ever eaten there, your mouth starts to water in anticipation, just pulling into the parking lot. Yes. it is that good.

Once our bellys were full, we noticed a new Spirit Halloween store just opening near the restaurant and decided to check out the new goods. I think they had just opened that day, since the shelves were barely stocked and the displays weren't even up yet. Lots of great new props, most a bit out of range for what I wanted to pay, but we did get some ideas and I did find a really good looking pirate hat (under $10 surprisingly!) and some other inexpensive accessories for the costumes and decor. In previous years, the next stop in the route would be to go to Frys Electronics in San Marcos, CA and gawk at all the cool electronics and to pick up more electronic components for my many unsuccessful attempts at animatronics... Ok really it was just an excuse to go to Frys Electronics and walk out with some tool that I absolutely couldnt live without. This year, however, due to the scale of the props, I decided to abandon the visions of animatronics and keep it simple. And to keep from being tempted at Frys, we moved on to the next stop in the pilgrimmage, which is almost as bad.... Harbor Freight Tools!

While I believe I could have convinced my wife that we needed to buy a new generator, I decided better of it and kept the focus on the task at hand.

As you can see the booty we obtained from this years pilgrimage was quite bountiful.with a couple of choice pieces to add to the collection!

Burelloween 2011 - A Pirates Odyssey - The Vision

2011-09-09T23:20:00.001-05:00

The date has been set, the theme has been decided, and now the fun begins.

The big question, how do we transform our ordinary suburban home into a rum swilling, feasting, and treasure hiding pirates cove, without breaking the bank and getting it done in time. And of course keeping in line with the reputation of over the top decoration we have cultivated over the years. Throw in a few more constraints, the house is a rental, so the props must be free standing with no permanent anchoring or attachment, and I can only build on the weekends.

The constraints may seem a little obvious, but some real planning and creativity need to be employed to actually achieve the vision. I plan to breakdown the project into smaller key elements and props and will post articles on the builds, as well as other thoughts as we pull it all together.

The vision is to transform this:

California Suburbia

Into something that looks like this (well hopefully better than this... I am not much of an artist)

I envision a large pirate ship on one side of the yard, facing a large cliff on the other which create a path way into the skull cave entrance. The ship would be kind of a ghost ship with all of the typical accessories including sails, cannons, a "skeleton" crew (pun intended), and of course a mermaid on the bow.

I don't think my wife really understood my vision until I took out a couple pieces of PVC pipe and held them up to get an idea of the scale of what I had in mind. Now she understands my vision of grandeur... and yes to all my Smart Alec friends out there... I am probably over compensating for other things!

So with the vision defined, the build list begins....

Burelloween 2011 A Pirates Odyssey

2011-08-29T15:18:00.001-05:00

It is almost that time of year.... the Annual Burell Halloween Party is coming. This being our 6th annual event, and as obsessive as we are, we figured it was time we branded it and gave it a name... And what better name than ours! Thus Burelloween is spawned from that cheesy candy mooching kid holiday, the need for some escapist adult fun, and the remnants of the twisted psychotic dreams that rumble around in the depths of the Burell familys collective brains.

After five years of zombie, vampire, classic horror, and other themes of the undead, we decided to change it up a bit and do a Pirate theme. Lucky for us, pirate themes include the dead, the tortured, the supernatural, and other twisted elements, allowing us to repurpose many of the props with only slight modification. Of course that leaves room to go completely over the top with some new decorations and props.

We have already begun the design and planning for the menu and the transformation of our house into a pirate island hideaway. Can we do it in time? That remains to be seen. The party is Saturday October 29, 2011... So mark your calendars and subscribe to this blog to follow our progress and for a sneak peek at the new props and decorations.