Ever since I was a kid, trick-or-treating on Halloween was by far one of the best times I had every year. I mean, when else can you dress up in any costume you want, walk through the streets with your friends and family and go door to door collecting candy? It’s one of the best parts of growing up, at least to me it was.

But things are changing. Here in Waverly, the city says we are going to celebrate a day early. Their reasoning? I’m not sure, but I’ve heard it was because they thought the high school football team would make it to playoffs, and their game would have been on the 31st. But really? Who cares!? Not me that’s for dang sure!

We should celebrate Halloween on HALLOWEEN. I don’t care what sports are going on! And honestly, do you think they would even THINK about moving Christmas!? “Oh yeah, we’ve got a volleyball game that day, sorry. Christmas is now on the 24th.” I mean really!? I’m outraged at the fact that this is going on.

Waverly is also having their “Halloween on Main” festival on the 30th. It’s when the local business located downtown hand out candy to kids that go up and down the street. So either, you can go trick or treating, or you can go to the festival they have downtown. Don’t get me wrong, I think “Halloween on Main” is a fantastic idea and I fully support it. In fact, I was at it last year and had a great time. I dressed up as Lou Natic and handed out fliers. It was great. However, I don’t see it as being the brightest idea to have it on the same night as trick-or-treating.

All in all I’m just upset with the city. They did this last year too. They had trick-or-treating a day early… I’m just annoyed that it keeps happening.

I even thought of protesting. Locking up the house, turning off the lights, and hanging a sign saying “Come back on HALLOWEEN.” on the front door. But, I really don’t want to upset any kids. Because in the end, it’s all about them.

So, I guess you’ll see me out on the 30th of October, ever so bitterly, handing out candy up front. The haunt will be open, but there will be nobody inside running it.

We will be back up and running HALLOWEEN NIGHT and will be open again on the first of November. It’s our last weekend so make sure you get out here while you can. This year is by far our biggest show ever. DON’T MISS OUT!!!

Last night we made a road trip down to Hampton where Kelly Reyndols puts on The Dragon’s Eye Haunted Barn. Eleven of us piled in to two cars and drove about an hour and a half… It probably would have been shorter if we wouldn’t have gotten lost! But in the end we had a great time! Kelly was kind enough to let is go through for free, and as many times as we wanted to go through… All of us went through at least twice and many of the kids went through four or five times! They were having a great time and it gave me a chance to play catch up with Kelly. Later on in the night, the guys from D & D Ranch came out and I got the chance to finaly meet them. We all started talking about haunts and perhaps getting an Iowa Haunters Association up and going… But we’ll see how that goes!

Anyways, I just wanted to thank Kelly and all of her crew for having us out there! We all had a great time and enjoyed your haunt very much!

Here are some pictures from the evening… More should be up sometime this week.

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Things around here are getting crazier and crazier as we get closer to Halloween! Friday night we had a fantastic turn out with over 100 people coming through the haunt. Then, on Saturday, we had our kids day from 3:00 to 6:00 and had around 50 or so people come on out with their little ones to go through the haunted house. It was great! And Saturday night we had our best turn out ever with over 250 people coming through the haunt in a single night! We had a line going down to the end of the block! It was awesome!

Tonight our SCREAM TEAM is going out to The Dragon’s Eye Haunted Barn located in Hampton, IA. We’re all very very excited to get out there this year to see what Kelly, the owner, has come up with! In past years we haven’t been able to attend the haunted house while it was actually up and running because they had the same schedule we had… But this year they’re open this Sunday so we are all very excited to see up up and running!

And last Sunday we all made a trip out to The Heart Of Darkness located in Waterloo, IA. It was great! We had 13 people total and Dolly and Kevin, the owners, were kind enough to not only let us in for free, but give us VIP passes to get to the front of the line! It was really great! We all made it through once, and some of us ended up going through a second time to make sure we saw everything! There’s a lot of cool stuff in there and we highly recommend going out there if you get the chance!

This year has just been getting better and better… and it’s hard to believe that it’s nearly over with just one more weekend left! So make sure you make out to Front Yard Fright Friday, October 31st and November 1st for your last chance of fear until next year!!!

On to the pictures from Friday the 24th and Saturday the 25th!!!

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We started off this weekend OK with having about 60 people come through Friday night. But then, on Saturday we had 200 people come through! It was fantastic! We had a line for 3 solid hours! In fact, we were working so hard, that about every hour, we had our actors take a quick five minute break to make sure nobody was going to overwork themselves!

Also, we had our kids day Saturday from 3:00 to 6:00 and had a good turn out for that also! We had Buster the Dog from the Digital Dog Pound, The Noid from Ziggy’s Domino’s Pizza, cookies from the Waverly Home Bakery, hot chocolate provided by Nestle, comic books from The Core and much more stuff! We had the haunted house open with the lights on and the scary props taken out so the little ones could go through without getting too scared. It went very well! Don’t forget! We are having another kids day next Saturday from 3:00 to 6:00! So if you didn’t make it last Saturday, make sure you come on out on the 25!

The whole weekend went very very well and we had a great time scaring the “YELL” out all who entered! We are all very anxious and very excited to get back to work next Friday at 7:00!

On to the pictures!

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Last Saturday Mary Stegmeir came out and interviewed us for the the Waterloo Courier! The story was supposed to run last Monday, but due to the amount of pictures in the article, it came out this morning! It’s a great article with tons of pictures so you’ll have to go out and get a copy! Or, you can click here to go to the story on the Courier’s website.

Also, we have our kids day today starting at 3:00 and going until 6:00! During kids day there are no actors inside the haunted house, most of the scary props are removed, and the lights in the haunted house are turned on. We will also have balloon animals, hot chocolate provided by Nestle, cookies from the Waverly Home Bakery, Buster the dog is going to be here from the Digital Dog Pound, The Noid will be here from Ziggy’s Domino’s pizza, and much more! So come on out today from 3:00 to 6:00! Also, if you can’t make it this Saturday, we are having another kids day next Saturday from 3:00 to 6:00!

Pictures from this weekend should be up sometime tomorrow… So stay tuned!