October/fall shenanigans

Amanda didn't want October, our Anniversary, or even Halloween to be uneventful this year and I think she was also trying to erase some of the negativity I still have left over from last year and our wedding disaster. I mean let's call it what it was, a disaster. Nothing worked out right and I was hurt pretty badly and still haven't managed to really get over it. Even with all the good stuff that did manage to happen around our wedding, all of which I am incredibly thankful for, I still have a hard time with the bad. Moving on. 

So, we both planned some stuff to do. Amanda's was more successful and exciting than my idea. I don't think she really liked mine too much. I wanted to drive up Mt. Spokane for an afternoon and see what we could see, explore a bit. I thought it would be fun to find places to have picnics and sit in nature, forest bathe, and so on. She was in a mood that day and when we found out that to go up was going to be ten dollars for a whole day, she was less than thrilled. Mostly because a discover pass is thirty dollars and gets you into all the Washington State Parks for a whole year. So, we turned around and came back down. 

But at least on the way I got to see a few things I didn't know were out and along the way. And I got some cool art reference photos.

On another day during October, Amanda got a groupon or something for tickets to go on a Haunted lake cruise on Lake Coeur d'Alene. Our friend Fiona was coming for a visit, so we went to pick her up and went to the lake early. I put my foot in the water to see how cold it was and decided swimming in the lake in October would be great for thirty seconds and only if I had a nice warm car to run to with hot cocoa waiting for me. 

I love how clear the lakes are here compared to the ones back home in Kansas. 

Rock!

I thought this view was really pretty and managed to catch the sun beam.

A picture of the Coeur d'Alene resort from the boat.

One of the lovely sunset photos I got.

I thought this one was very gloomy and pretty.

And my camera still didn't do the blazing pink in the sky justice.

A zoom in shot.

Some fall trees 

A pretty leaf.

The Twins took us to Silverwood for our anniversary and because they really like going with us. It was a lot of fun and I did get some pictures and even some video, but I think they are all over on my Instagram. Meaning, I was dumb and deleted them from my phone. 

Also during the month we went to see the Hobbit house in town. The owners of this big house and the little Hobbit house put on a free Halloween "come and see" and partnered with some trick or treat group that, if I remember correctly, does a safe neighborhood kind of thing. Anyway it was free to go to and you could see the Hobbit house for free with a donation of a children's book for needy kids.  We took a couple and it seemed that a lot of the people who came did the same.

This is a poster for the group they were collecting the books for.

A ring wraith, this guy managed to sneak up and scare the crap out of me twice! 

Just some of the cute decorations. In fact, each decoration had a little story to go with it. We didn't realize that until after we had seen the Hobbit house and I was cold and worn out. There were a lot of people and we stood in line for quite a while, both of which are hard on me. 

And here is the little Hobbit house. It is so cute and yes, that is a dragon above it.

a barrel!

I loved this metal door decoration they had.

I wanted to get more pictures of the interior and take more time to look around but there was still quite a long line behind us and I wanted to let the kids have time to get in and see the place. It was getting late and a lot of the kids were little, and we all know how cold, tired kids can get cranky. 

Some of the outside. I loved all the little decorations. 

Moving on to Halloween...

Here is some of the Halloween decor we had in our house

Amanda found what she calls her 'opera singer' at walmart this year. It's a tree topper and we kept it out to put on our Xmas tree.

We had candles aplenty and I decorated two jars I found at the dollar tree, not that you can seem them that well.

I found this pretty Witch tree topper at Ross. I've always wanted a 'pretty' witch. People seem to think that witches needs to be green or old or look like creepy old ladies, but that's not the case. So when I saw her for a reasonable price, I snatched her right up and brought her home. She too, was kept out and is hanging out in the office. 

Narcisa was hanging out on the kitchen table with me on Halloween night. This was before dinner and after our trip to the Campbell house here in town. They were a rich family and their house is a historical point of interest and museum. I didn't take my phone with me so I will just have to go back and get pictures another time. It is a beautiful Victorian era house and I pretty much want live there. But back to my house...

My friend Felicia gave me this cute cat and we set him on one of our pumpkins!

Amanda's luminary made from card stock, tissue paper, and a big pickle jar. We made them with our friend Rachel two years ago.

Here is mine. 

I had made little cauldrons for friends for something that got cancelled. So we enjoyed them over a couple of days.

I really liked this project and want to do it again, especially since I know how 

I did have more candy in them, it was just under the cotton candy. 

And here is me, I was a demon. I had black wings, my horns, and had done my make up.

This was just a beautiful display at Fuego in the mall. I loved the masks and would like to use them as inspiration for making some of my own. I've made a mask before and really loved it.

One day I went to work to see Amanda and took a picture of one of the halls in the old chronicle building. I love the decor.

This is a poster Amanda got me of Shiro from Voltron. It was done by Missy Pena and you can find her on twitter.

This was the very last bit of the Halloween Season activities. We went down to Moscow, Id to visit the twins and also go try out a spooky escape room at Puzzle IQ. What we learned was that I will look in a bucket of icky water and know there is something in but not put my hand in and make someone else do it. That Amanda moves stuff she's not supposed to, and that when they say look at everything, Amanda and I take them very seriously and go as far as taking apart furniture to look for clues. LOL! They told us we didn't have to take apart the furniture. Also, that the Twin, Amanda, and I actually make a pretty good team when doing this. We each find things the other miss. So we managed to do the escape room without a single hint with 16 minutes to spare. The total time we were allowed was 45 minutes. It was a lot of fun and needless to say, we are hooked. We've been looking at other escape rooms around, checking prices and themes and such.

Lastly, on a more recent trip down to visit the twins, we stopped in Potlatch, Id. Along I 90 there is a little dinner called Dad's Diner. It didn't used to be called that. Back in the 1940's my Grandmother's Dad's cousin worked out in the area and his wife worked in the diner. At some point the cousin died and eventually his wife bought the diner and ran it for many years. That was the cup "Ireland's Inn" that was in another blog post. Anyway, her son, my Grandma's cousin, apparently still lives in Deary. Which is kind of cool. The family doesn't own the place anymore, but it's really neat to see where my family has been and walk where they walked. 

Belated Haunted Hump Day.

I'm a bit late on the Haunted Hump day fun this week and missed last week entirely. But I haven't been feeling good and have been a bit busy. That's my excuse and I am sticking to it. 

I made this sun catcher thing for a friend for her birthday. It's in my coffin tray for the photo op, and in hindsight, I should have painted the wood black, but she liked it all the same. It seemed to fit with the Goddesses she's been drawn to lately and somehow when I was making it, I knew it had to go to her. I know it's not really a Halloween Craft per se, but the feel of it, to me, fits for this month.

 October 13th was Amanda and my 1st year anniversary of being married. We've been together for 11 years now. Anyway, the Twins, Bethy and Ashlee, like going to Scarrywood an wanted us to go with them, so they bought our tickets as a present. They certainly didn't have to do that, but we did appreciate it.

So Scarrywood, for those who aren't familiar with our area of the world, is where Silverwood Theme park flips itself into a giant haunted theme park every year. They run some rides, not all, have scare zones, and several themed haunted houses. The scare zones are open and you pass through them to get to the other stuff. There was Clown Town- which is my least favorite-, a spider section, The Doll's house- which was my favorite-, a chainsaw guy, a scarecrow corn maze-ish area, and a lot of actors walking around spooking people.  

Of the themed Haunted houses I went to, there was Blood Bayou, which is a hillbilly, Southern swampy, cannibal theme. I had trouble with the uneven ground in that one, and cannibals aren't really my thing, but the detail in that haunt is really beautiful. I just wish we didn't have to be pushed through so fast. I would have liked to stay in some portions to admire the work they'd put into it. But when you have a long line of people behind you, you move. 

The second haunt I went to was Pharaoh's Tomb. This one was a new haunt for the park and I guess some people think it needed some more work. I, on the other hand, really enjoyed it. The detail on this one was lovely and again, I would have liked to stay and look at the work done in more depth. 

I went to the magic show, Dillusion, put on by Nick and Amanda Norton. I always see their magic show when I go to Silverwood, and this year they were doing a Halloween one. I loved it, as usual!

This is the Doll's House Scare Zone.

One of the creepy dolls stopping a person. She began jumping as I was taking the photo. They liked stepping in people's way to stare at them and when people would try to move around them, the dolls would step with them, blocking their path. It was so much fun to watch them. One guy saw them said  "Fuck no!" and took off like a track star. One of the dolls chased after him just as fast and I laughed my ass off. There was even an Andy doll from Raggidy Ann and Andy, but he had a messed up face. He was also dragging a metal chair around which was a bit obnoxious. He got me twice. LOL! I was sitting while my wife and friends went to ride rollercoasters or visit haunted houses I didn't want to go through. (I had to rest because my back was being an asshat.) He would come out of my field of vision when I wasn't paying attention, sneaky fucker. 

This is a photo op we got with the dolls. Amanda's taking the picture and managed to only get half of me, there on the far right, the girl on the left is Ashlee and the right next to me is Bethy. 

On the home front, we have been super tired this week. I think I've slept more than I have been awake. Amanda and I have been taking it semi easy by watching netflix in the evenings. Last night I began The Curious Creations of Christine McConnell. I freaking love it! I saw, somewhere, that someone mentioned her being the Martha Stewart Goth people. Or something close to that. She totally is! And her house mates crack me up. Which was so very needed last night. My depression monster has been dragging me back down, horribly down, this week. Laughing felt so good. 

Earlier in the week Amanda and I watched The Haunting of Hill House with our friend Bethy. She lives about a hour and half away from us, so we call her and cue up netflix in time with hers and that's how we watch movies with her. We've done that with Cousin Kat, who live across the country from us a time or two as well. Anyway, we pretty much binged this show over three nights. We all really liked it. It was so creepy and fun. Definitely worth a watch.

On a trip to Ross to look at Halloween stuff, Amanda bought me a cup. I will share it of course. She also got me towels for the kitchen that say "I love you to the tomb and back", which fit us more than my kitchen at the moment, but I still loved them. When I was still working at my friend's bakery, I'd bought her a skull spoon rest. When my depression gets super bad or I have a bad fibro flare, she's been stepping in to cook, so I thought she'd like it. 

We finished the entertainment center I think two weeks ago and I found our Halloween decor from the garage. I managed to hurt myself when trying to pick up one of the tubs, it was caught on something and ugh, it was bad. But, I got both tubs in and I didn't even put everything we have out. Some of stuff isn't Halloween decor, but our normal decor, and I would show more, but the house is a little messy with laundry I've folded an some art supplies. Amanda got a little candle happy, but I like it, so it's okay, they are just hiding a couple of things. The cats like it too. They like jumping up behind stuff to look out the window.

I've one a little with the little mantle over our fireplace. We'd planned to finish the painting and do touch ups, but we just didn't get to it this year. We'll work on it soon and I have plans to build a fireplace mantle and facing. That little one just doesn't do it for me. 

I put some dollar tree puple led lights in the alcove and while this is blurry as hell, I really like the result.

I've also added some around the living room and really liked how they look on this wall shelf- which you will better see in moment.

This was the shelf before we figured out what we wanted on it. Batlas stayed of course, its the safest place for him. Also, Amanda and I took all the pictures and art we had with us to a thrift store and found frames there. Gold was not an accent we were planning on having, but I really loved the amount of vintage/antique-ish frames they had and just went with it! Some frames we got were black or we painted them black. A couple of pieces I made, like the key one and butterfly one.. that you can't really see.

Of course this was all done before we got our sofa back, but that's the current layout. I want to make a couple little things to put in, but too much more will be, well, too much.

Well, there you have it. 

Someday, I will do a proper house tour so you can see it seamlessly.