DIY Halloween Graveyard Tour — Fog Chiller, Gravestones, and More

Second year building a Halloween graveyard in the front yard, and this is the whole tour — what I built, how I built it, and the parts I got wrong. It started last year with a $99 clearance archway from Lowe's about eight days before Halloween. We'd just moved down to North Carolina, I'd always lived in apartments in New York, and there wasn't really a plan. This year I had a bit more time, and I built most of what's out there: the fence, the gravestones, the pillars, the coffin, and a fog chiller that worked a lot better than I expected. A lot of the tutorials online show everything cut perfectly and placed perfectly. Mine wasn't. I messed up the miter joints on the pillars, I blew out some holes on the fence posts, and the cauldron lights shorted out and tripped the whole breaker the day before Halloween. At night, with everything painted, nobody noticed any of it. That's kind of the point. If there's something in here you want me to go deeper on, just ask in the comments. CHAPTERS 00:00 Welcome, and the yard at night 01:30 The archway that started it — $99 on clearance 03:04 The fence: furring strips, PVC and 3D-printed finials 08:00 Gravestones: XPS foam, Drylok and a Cricut stencil 11:19 The pillars, and the miter joints I got wrong 14:49 Lighting the yard, and what I'd change 16:15 The pallet-wood coffin, and Fred 17:22 The witch's cauldron that actually mists 23:07 The DIY fog chiller 26:57 What I'd do differently next year WHAT'S IN THE YARD Archway — started life as a Nevermore Academy piece from Lowe's, $99 on clearance Fence — 1x1 furring strips and PVC, 3D-printed finials, flicker flames on a passive IR sensor Gravestones — 2" XPS foam, Drylok, Cricut stencils, a Dremel, and garden stakes Pillars — where the miter joints went wrong, and what I did instead Lighting — four Nova Stella spots plus the fence post flicker flames Coffin — pallet wood with an LED strip stapled around the inside Fred — a styrofoam head, a pool noodle, and a tripod that broke Cauldron — built by my fiancée, a six-port electrostatic mister sitting over pond lights Fog — fog machine into a DIY chiller (dry ice and frozen bottles), out through drilled drainage pipe TUTORIALS I FOLLOWED Gravestones — Van Oaks Props:    • DIY ULTRA Realistic Halloween Tombstones!   Fence —    • DIY HALLOWEEN CEMETERY FENCING...EASY TO M...   Thanks for watching. Go make some stuff.