WELCOME FOOLISH MORTALS, to tonight's blog post! One year ago, almost to the day, my wife Brita and I hosted our annual family Halloween party. After years of thinking that Disney's the Haunted Mansion would be a cool theme to bring to life, we finally made it happen! We collected things for years (here and there) at the Disney Parks and ShopDisney.com with this party in mind and finally put them to use last October. I meant to document this here last year, but time slipped away as it often does. I figured with Halloween right around the corner, now would be as good a time as any to finally share what we came up with. Such great memories!
The games/prizes and decor prep started the night before. Below you can see Brita wrapping prizes in a giant ball of Saran Wrap/Press'n Seal. This was for one of the main games of the party, known as "The Plastic Wrap Game"! If you don't know how this game works, you can learn more
HERE. In short, the first person with the ball starts unwrapping the ball while the
person on their right rolls a pair of dice, trying to roll doubles. Once doubles are rolled, the ball is passed to the next player and the sequence begins again. The person with the ball does not stop unwrapping until the person to
their right rolls doubles. This creates an urgency to the game! The person rolling the dice wants to do so as quickly as possible so they can get
the ball and have a shot at unwrapping. The best part is you get to keep the treasures you unwrap.
Our prizes included gift cards, Trader Joe's Peanut Butter Cups, Yankee Candle Air Fresheners, Burt's Bees Pumpkin Spice Chapstick, two festive bars of soap we picked up at
Basin while in Disney World (which is where we were the week leading up to our party) and a Halloween inspired bath bomb from
Lush in the center.
Another game we played is the classic "Left Right Story" game! I'm sure you all know how that is played, but if you don't, here's how it goes down: All of your guests sit in a circle and two of them are handed a prize (the prizes for the game we chose are seen below—Mickey caramel apples, which we also brought back with us from WDW and decked out with some Haunted Mansion stickers). As the host reads the story (which is written to include many uses of the words left and right throughout), the guests pass the prizes to the left or right every time either word is said. Whoever ends up with the prizes at the end of the story (of course) is the winner!
For this party, Brita and I wrote our very own "Left Right" story inspired by the narrative of the Haunted Mansion ride! I have such distinct memories writing this with my wife while waiting over two hours in line for the Na'vi River Journey ride at Animal Kingdom (which we
thought was Flight of Passage (terrible rookie mistake; it was our first time visiting Pandora). Anyway for your convenience, I've included the story we wrote below in case you'd like to use it for YOUR Halloween party. Enjoy!
Now flash forward to the next night, the night of the actual party. Everything was completed right on time and I was able to document all the Haunted Mansion inspired decor we set up just before our guests began to arrive. I hope you appreciate all the details and thought that was put into it!
Note: something you can't get from just seeing photos is that I also included the Haunted Mansion sounds and soundtrack playing in the background to make our guests feel like they were somewhat there.
Below you can see three awesomely stylized Haunted Mansion postcards, which we had picked up in Disney World at the Memento Mori gift shop (we did the framing ourselves once we got home). There's one featuring the iconic bride Constance Hatchaway, one of the mansion itself and one of the mysterious Hatbox Ghost—all by artist
Brian Fyffe.
Below is a set of
Haunted Mansion playing cards, also purchased at Walt Disney World.
The tin sign below featuring Madame Leota was an Amzon purchase, though I'm not seeing it available on there anymore. Oh and how do you like my fake spider webs? I wanted to do the real spiders proud.
These two porcelain figurines are meant to take inspiration from the attic scene in the Haunted Mansion. Similar figures, including the broken off head, can be spotted there during the ride (and yes, we beheaded the boy just for this party—sorry buddy).
Our hutch below is where most of the decorations we collected got displayed! From top left to bottom right, you can spot: a Madame Leota postcard (by artist
Jeff Granito), The Haunted Mansion picture book (from
Amazon), "Beware of Hitchhiking Ghosts" stacking blocks (from
Amazon), Haunted Mansion Library Bookends (featuring the iconic staring busts; purchased at the Disney World Memento Mori gift shop), a generic crow (from Michael's), a post card of the "Aging Man" portrait seen in the Haunted Mansion foyer (another Memento Mori purchase), a generic skull, miniature replicas of all four stretching portraits (picked up a couple years ago on ShopDisney) and the "Tomb Sweet Tomb" box that some Haunted Mansion coasters came in (more on those later).
My wife's Haunted Mansion Dooney and Bourke bag had to make an appearance.
On the ladder we hung my wife's actual wedding veil and corset to represent Constance Hatchaway,
the "Black Widow Bride".
We purchased this cool "Welcome Foolish Mortals" metal sign on ShopDisney a couple years ago. And notice the purple candle sticks? I like how the Haunted Mansion incorporates the color purple, so we had to capture that subtlety.
We purchased this Haunted Mansion pillow at the Memento Mori gift shop last October during our trip. It was a nice last minute touch.
This "cracked glass" is a deep cut reference only the hardcore Haunted Mansion fans will know. Learn more
HERE.
And how could we not incorporate a "Death Certificate"? This was a printable I found online.
Note: the name we wrote in, Darin Horne, is my brother-in-law.
Now onto possibly the best part—the food! For the centerpiece, we featured a Madame Leota tombstone replica (which we purchased on ShopDisney), a mini red rose plant (a reference to the rose plant outside of the Haunted Mansion in WDW) and the tombstone coasters I had mentioned earlier (also from ShopDisney).
Now I gotta to say, the menu we created was pretty brilliant. Each food item was inspired by one of the stretching portraits (among others)! I have to give my wife credit for coming up with most of these. She's so incredibly clever!
First up, we served "Quicksand-wiches", inspired of course by the quicksand stretching portrait. These were essentially BBQ pulled pork sliders that you could stack with a "tower of toppings" (cheese, coleslaw and pickles). Get it?? Three stacked men, three toppings.
For our beverage, inspired by the tightrope walker stretching portrait, we served "Pink Lemonade with candy crocodiles"—topped with pink cocktail umbrellas that we made ourselves!
Next up, inspired by the old woman stretching portrait (
FUN FACT: that's confirmed to be Constance Hatchaway later in life), we have "Constance Hatchaway's Assorted Cheeses". I think the hatchets in the cheese say it all.
Our "Jalapeno Popper Dip" was an explosive hit, inspired by the bearded man/dynamite stretching portrait. The best part of this dip (not captured below) was that we stuck lit sparklers in it to give it a dangerous flair.
Who doesn't love "Deviled Eggs"? We thought the name already was spooky enough for a Halloween party, but to give them that added Haunted Mansion flavor, we dubbed them as a "Gracey Family Recipe" (referring to
Master Gracey of course).
For dessert, we had a Black Forrest (ooohhh scary) birthday cake—inspired by everyone's favorite birthday party/ballroom scene in the Haunted Mansion! And do you want another extremely deep cut reference? The plates below are paper plate versions of the EXACT china used on the table during this scene in the mansion (called
Spode Blue Italian). How do you like that?
Blood drip candles are always a hit at our Halloween party, year after year! They're a must. A striking, simple effect.
After dinner, our first activity was telling creepy fortunes to our guests (based on which playing card they pulled). Super fun! It was a great way to start the festivities and set the tone.
We then told the "Left Right Story" (as talked about earlier)...
...and played the the "Plastic Wrap Game" after that.
To end the evening, I shared the full story of the Haunted Mansion; including fun facts, theories, character connections, Easter eggs, hidden mysteries and a bit of history. I even taught my family all about the mystery of the Hatbox Ghost (and showed a video), which no one had heard before. It was so much fun and I learned so much preparing for all this as well!
Last but not least, it was time to cut into that frightfully delicious Black Forrest cake for dessert.
Before all our guests went their separate ways, we took some photos with these fun Halloween party frames (which I acquired from my days working at the Disney Store) to remember the evening. Below you can see your "ghost hosts" (me and my wife Brita; costume shirt and apron purchased at Memento Mori) and everyone who attended.
For our parting "Thank You" gifts, we handed out individual bags of Trader Joe's delicious Candycorn Popcorn! Brita did an awesome job creating the custom tags featuring the hitchhiking ghosts. So well done! Notice how the "Thank You" font even features the iconic purple
Haunted Mansion wallpaper? You mega fans will know exactly what that is. Such a nice, subtle touch that Brita through in there!
Well I guess that's it everyone! I hope you enjoyed seeing all the work we put into this Haunted Mansion themed party. Maybe we even inspired some creativity in you to do something similar! Maybe you found this page looking for ideas and, if so, hopefully you fund some good ones. Please let me know if you have any questions, I'm always happy to help if you need clarification on anything! You'll also want to be sure to check out the videos I posted on my
Instagram stories (saved on my feed as a story highlight).
Hurry back... hurry back...
