Haunted Humpday rolls around again and I thought I didn't have anything to share for it this week, and then I remembered, yes I do! So I'm jumping in again. But first, let's thank our host Marfi-topia, for hosting this even every year! Thank you!!!
front
At Wal-Mart, while looking for journal possibilities for Amanda's birthday, I found small binders, about half the size of the regular assortment. I bought one for her along with another type- I've mentioned this before, I think. But I liked it so much that I went back and bought one for myself. Amanda has yet to decorate hers, but I've done mine and made it 'witchy'.
What I like about these binders is that they are pretty durable, which in our house is kind of a blessing. Between us and the cats, stuff gets dropped and knocked off tables and such. I also like that I can decorate and not worry about what I've done getting ruined easily- barring a spill.
spine
So what I did was measure out scrapbook paper from the book I bought this year at Michael's, to do the spine and front. Amanda had to help me with a little of it because I have trouble scooting paper into the spine slot.
On the front I used a tag from my scrapbook supplies and then added stickers from a small book of stickers of the same theme as the scrapbook paper.
Back
On the back I didn't want to fight with the paper and two hardware pieces. So instead, I used one of the pretty tarot card cards from another batch of goodies from this theme. Honestly, if I had the money, I would buy two more of what I have from this scrapbook/journaling/and craft theme.
On the inside, I used some planner stickers and inspirational quotes I saved and printed on sticker paper to move into a kind of moon/witch theme.
Links for the Moonlit Manor themed stickers and stuff are here:
Since I suddenly find myself with a week off, I'm hoping to dig the Halloween decorations out of the garage and start decorating! Then, perhaps I will be able to do a spooky tour of our living room (still in progress), as a haunted humpday post!
Recently, I decided to start squirreling away some money for the things Amanda and I need or want. I need things like underwire replacements for bras and I want to buy an embroidery machine. I also want to save up and get an air conditioner for the bedroom and have a down payment for a new-to-us car. We'd also like to make some repairs and improvements to our house. But in the more upcoming savings deaprtment, I have been saving for Halloween. We haven't really been able to do Halloween shopping and since this is really the time of year that Torrid USED to have decent clothes in my preferred style come out (before the GAP bought them-assholes) and stores come out with decor or things to make decor that fits my decorating style, yeah, we or well, I decided to save a little. Of course, I told Amanda what I was doing and she was for it.
So, on a day she had off and I had off, we decided to take a trip to Joann's and we found a few small things. The trip was mostly geared to window shop and research the texture and feel of what fabrics I want to use for some costumes and clothing later on. But we made it out of the store with a few little things. I'll get to the rest of them in a later post, this one is about a remote tray.
I found this coffin tray and knew it was coming home with me. The embellishments, above, were coming home with me too. You can never have too many of those.
I also knew this pretty holographic star and moon paper was coming home too. I've had a sheet of this before. Its a vinyl, sticker paper you can find in the scrap booking section.
I was thinking of making the coffin a shelf or open shadow box, but decided against it while I was painting it with black acrylic. I sealed it after it was painted with a clear polyurethane spray.
After the polyurethane coat dried, I measured and cut the sticker paper and had Amanda put on the bottom inside of the tray. She, for some reason, can apply that kind of paper much easier than I can.
To finish it off, I used the black embellishments on the rim and added my remotes. Its silly, but works much better than the caddy I had the in before and its easier to move from place to place. When we get our sofa back, we're going to put this tray on the ottoman or a side table.
Unfortunately, that's all I have for today.
I'm going to make some tea, go a round with my netti pot, and go watch something from the warm, cozy comfort of my bed.
It's a sad day when its the last Haunted Humpday of the year. I hope everyone has had fun.
For this last hurrah, I'm including some of the pictures from out Halloween party. I have some of our guests, but those are just for us. For now.
Here's a bit of the living room decor. We actually went a little light, but we don't really have tons of room and sometimes simple is best.
I made some witchy cup cakes and some that say boo. I also made two round cakes.
A friend of ours made these wonderful candied apples.
That same friend also made 1 bloody mummy apple. She made some amazing gluten and dairy free mini cup cakes with sugar glass shards and the red candy like that on this apple. I really liked it save for the chickpea or garbanzo bean texture in the cupcake mix she used. A lot of gluten free flowers have that problem- textures I don't really like. Still, the cupcakes were good!
We made a black punch. It is not quite the same as It's Black Friday's death punch but it was yummy and black and for me that was all that mattered. Amanda made lemonade ice slabs with gummy worms to add to it and that didn't exactly turn out so well, but they didn't affect the punch. We had alcohol and a non-alcoholic versions which I added notes to stating which one was poision and which one wasn't.
Here is the desert spread. The main fare was a nacho bar and thanks to those who helped pitch in.
Some days my camera isn't a total ass and lets me get pretty shots.
Amanda took some photos of me in my costume. We went outside for some and I thought I would share one that I added a fun what pixlr calls "veil" filter to. Its cheesy, but I like it.
My last photo is so goofy. I'm not sure how it happened. I think its cute and silly, and Amanda loves it. My Dad gave me such shit about teasing my hair, calling me Tammy Faye Bakker. I do not. Nope, not even close! Then again Dad was being quite the weasel turd that day. ( Dad used to call me weasel butt so I would say he was one worse- a weasel turd.)
Well, that's it for this year's Haunted Humpday! Hope everyone has a happy and safe Halloween, enjoy parties, trick or treating, haunted housing visits, and any rituals you might have!
It is Haunted Humpday again and a few days ago I found this lovely hand painted glass and the skull candles below in my mail box. It was sent from a sweet lady in West Virginia for the Halloween swap. I LOVE THEM! Her paint work is amazing and my stupid camera phone doesn't do it justice. I love her use of perspective too!
Here is a photo of the back side.
These weren't the only things we received in the mail. Amanda placed an order on Amazon for a Spirit board, my vampire fangs, and some white foundation and pressed powder.
She has a thing for circles and spirals and well, skulls, so I think she picked the perfect board.
These fangs from Scarecrow have a putty that will harden so I can have a custom fit. Which means they won't fall out of my mouth. I am so freaking excited to have a set of these again. I had some once before, but they got lost in one of our moves.
My foundation is by Stargazer and the test I did on my hand gave me two answers. First, I am not allergic to it and didn't get a chemical burn. And secondly, it is light, it is smooth, and it doesn't have a smell that is going to drive me nuts or make me sick after awhile. In fact, so far, I really love it.
The two things above are pretties a friend gave me. The skulls are for our early Halloween party and the spiderweb and spiders are a die cut wood garland that I can paint and hang up. She actually got me two of those. I will probably leave the spiders off, because I don't like them.
This last photo is a bag I made. I had Amanda draw a bat on the fabric when my embroidery template couldn't be seen through it enough to trace. I drew on the lettering and then went to work. When I was finished, I sewed up the sides, put in a hem and draw string section at the top and slipped in some ribbon to cinch it shut. I did it all by hand, sewing included. Dragging out the sewing machine fora five minute job after the weekend I had, just didn't seem like something really wanted to do... I finished this either Sat or Sunday evening. Anyway, it does in fact have my little gemstones inside.
The other night our friend Rachel came over and we put her idea to put my empty gallon pickle jars to use. I have a pickle addiction, but hey it is better than smoking and its a nice 0 calorie snack. (I am currently out and very sad about it.) We made luminaries.
For mine, I had Amanda draw some bats out on black card stock. I already had a silhouette of a witch, you can find free ones on google. Anyway, I put down a layer of slightly watered down modge podge and tissue paper. Then I laid down the bats and witch after cutting them out, and put down another layer of tissue paper atop them to help lock them into place. I made two other jars, one with parts of a coloring page I had been coloring and then other with netting and stickers, the latter of which is below.
Rachel did a lovely tree, graveyard, and fence on hers, which I didn't get a picture of. But I did get a picture of Amanda's- which I thought I hadn't when I was telling a friend about it this morning. Turns out I did, yay!
Amanda likes H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu and Octopi, so naturally she went with something along those lines. Meet Cthulhu. But it gets better...
He's going to eat the people of Seattle.
At the moment that is all from the craft-o-sphere. It looks like only three of our pumpkins were good We've got them sitting on our patio for a little sun, to help two of them finish turning orange. Apart from that, I am saving some stories for next week.
However, we have watched two crappy Vampire movies and not too long ago, we watched Conjuring 2.
Neither of the vampire movies were very good, I can't even remember there names. While one was on netflix and the other on Amazon prime, I think both were independant- which is sad because sometimes independent films can be really good. One was supposed to have been campy but ended up just being boring and an excuse for sex. the other had plot holes, was a little difficult to follow in some places, and whatever campiness they were going for, failed.
The Conjuring 2
I loved this movie. I really enjoyed the first one and I liked Annabelle. I don't know which I would say is better, I think all three each have equal footing. There's some foreshadowing in the beginning that I picked up on that Amanda missed, its so subtle and artfully done. I remember being a little confused and then when something is revealed, I was like, that's was awesome ad very well done. I don't want to spoil the fun of it though, so I'm not going to say what it is.
For this Haunted Humpday I'm sharing some of the Halloween decor we've brought out this season. Please excuse the quality of the photos, I took them with my cell phone camera which I have a love hate relationship with. We also have more decor and I am making little pieces every so often- mostly in the form of coloring sheets this year.
I decided to collage my photos for the purpose of space. The witch sign and coffin chalkboard sign are in my kitchen, obviously. I glued the wooden bottle piece to the chalk board. The fox salt shakers are from Wal-Mart. My Wal-Mart is always hit and miss with a lot of stuff and for some reason they only had the one piece, there's supposed to be a another piece of a fox laying down. Amanda thought a good way to tell between the two was to give one of them a bow. The Pumpkin chimes are from Aanda's Mom two Xmas' ago. We had them in storage to keep them safe until we had our own place and could bring them out at the right time.
Collage #2 is full of stuff at various points in the living room, kitchen, and hall way. Starting from the top left we have the skulls I made a couple years ago. For some reason two of them really like to face the wall. Next are my Dollar Tree magnets, a Lily Munster coloring page I found and colored, and my blurred dialogue idea for a story I am working on. Third is a little ghost a friend gave us, Narcisa's treat jar, a pretty flower arrangement, and a little coffin box I made. Middle photo is of my fireplace mantle. You can see some branches of my Halloween Tree. this photo was take pre-fixing of my raven candle holder- yes, I broke it, but it's fixed now. The bottom left photo is another Dollar Tree find of a Vampress that I hung behinf the front door. Next is my Resting Witch Face mug which we picked up at Wal-Mart this year and lastly is a cute Cool Gear can/bottle/cup thing also found at Wal-mart but from the year before.
On to something interesting and a spooky story...
The first Haunted Humpday story I shared this year, I spoke of a creepy being with red eyes that scared the shit out of when I was a little girl. I never knew what the thing was called. A couple of days ago that changed, I think, when I was watching this video, and heard The_Goblin_Queen call things like it "shadow people". She's doing a series on her channel called "The Lady of Haunts". Which is pretty neat, if you want to check it out.
Anyway, I've decided to look into shadow people more in depth and even managed to come up with a plan, ha ha another list, of things I want to research and write about- mostly for personal fancy and interest and probably not for my blog. So that's kind of a stumble upon hey I might not have such a dead end, what the fuck didn't I think of this sort of resolution direction, what have you.
Spooky story:
Another of my personal experiences comes from when I was a child, around 5 yrs old. I awoke in the middle of the night. I don't remember being scared, but I do remember my two cats, Pandy and Ceaser, and our dog, Obi, curled up on my bed with me. That's kind of a rare thing because Pandy generally hid from me. I was not the nicest human friend to her when we first got her. I am sad to say that I was actually quite mean, but learned that you don't try to pierce the cat's ear with scissors so she can wear earrings like the cats on TV or try to keep her in your closet by tying yarn around her neck and putting her on the high shelf. (I learned how to be a good cat owner very quickly and Pandy and I later had a much better and proper relationship.)
But I digress, it was odd for her to be curled up on my bed, while it wasn't odd for Ceaser and Obi. Still she was there.
I remember laying there, looking out the window at the big tree in the back yard, watching the tree in the back yard sway to and fro when I heard something roll across the bathroom counter and into the sink with enough force that it did the back and forth motion in the sick twice before settling. I knew exactly what that was, a yellow tractor I'd brought home from my Grandma's house to play with. I'd left it in the bathroom, when I'd been playing with it, in the sink (I liked to play in the water, much to my Mom's annoyance), the evening before, and to make sure it wouldn't get knocked off on the floor, I'd pushed it up into the corner. There was no way it could have moved on its own. Since the animals were in my room, I knew they hadn't done it. My parents were asleep, I heard them both snoring across the hall. That's when I got scared. I remember reaching for Ceaser and closing my eyes tight, hoping I would just go to sleep. At this point, I knew that my Mom had miscarried with my older sister and my younger brother so I remember hoping that it was just one of my siblings coming to play with my toys and oddly enough, I remember hoping they weren't mad at me for getting to have toys while they didn't.
The next morning, when my Mom woke me up, I went to the bathroom, and guess what was in the sink? My tractor. I took it out of the sink and never left it there again. In fact, I never left it where it could roll across anything ever again. I'm not sure what happened to the tractor. I suppose it made its way back to Grandma's house or got put in with some things to go to the Goodwill.
The past two days I have been working on a project for my soon to be Etsy store. I will admit that this project is taking a good deal longer than I wanted, expected, and estimated it to. This project is also taking its toll on my back and even my hips in a way that I didn't imagine. But. It's kind of worth it. I am enjoying the project, enjoying that I am catching up on Once Upon a Time- well, not totally watching more like listening with glimpses of the TV here and there-, and I am even enjoying Narcisa's curiosity. She wants to know what I am doing and seems to want to be part of it- or at least smell everything. Annother bit of fun I've had while working on this, has been to watch the squirrel's come up to my patio, jump on the table, and then crawl through my tomato plants to steal tomatoes. Sure, it's annoying but its also cute, and it's live cat TV for Narcisa. She seems to really like watching them and never growls or hisses.
However, I need a tiny break, hence the blog post.
So, I thought I would share some of my project today as my offering for Haunted Humpday. Above are some unfinished Skull Ornaments that will be Dia de Los Muertos by the time I am finished with them- for better for worse. I'd thought about painting them, but I think I will try using sharpies first then glitterfying them.
Next one of the owls I made, it too is unfinished. I want to add googly eyes and beaks. Yesterday, when it was getting to be time to go pick up Amanda and also start making dinner, I noticed that I too was glittery. I'm not sure how glitter made it on to my chest, I certainly didn't rub it in or even scratch, it just happened. I suppose that's why my friends call glitter craft herpes?
On to white candles. Since my Grandma has been sick, I've been imbuing white chime candles with some of my own energy, or at least trying to, and then burning them for her. What I picture is drawing up white light- coloring being very important to me and signifying healing- from my core and pushing it into the candle while focusing on my Grandma. It seems to be working. Every time I burn a candle she gets to feeling a little better. I've done it three times, only because she got to feeling better for a few days and then wasn't feeling very well. Right now, things seem to be sticking, so that's a positive. However, it seems that I need to do this for my Mom. I called her this morning, because it had been a couple of days since I had talked to her, and she sounded so awful. Worse, the things she said kind of unnerved me. She said that she loved me, that I needed to believe in myself as much as she does, that I am a wonderful writer, and that Dad would get a hold of me a little later.
Don't get me wrong, my Mom tells me she loves me all the time. She has told me that I need to get my confidence back and that I am a good writer and all of that before. It was the way in which she said it, almost like a goodbye, that's kind of freaking me out. I'm sure she didn't mean it like that, but she said she has a horrible migraine and is really sick. But from what? For how long? And, can they get her to the doctor? I won't know until I talk to my Dad later. Its very frustrating. I think I have two white chime candles left and it looks like I am going to need say screw it and buy a white taper candle for my Mom, because the way she sounded, it's going to take a lot for her to feel better.
Since I am sick, I didn't feel up to picking up my house and taking pictures of my spooky decor. Don't worry, I am getting to it and haven't forgotten. Nor have I forgotten that I said I would share some pumpkin pictures on a Halloween Swap page on Facebook- they are on a camera that was moved and I keep forgetting to go look and to ask where it is. Fear not, I have made a page long list of stuff I want to try and accomplish over the next several days. Lists make my life so much easier.
So, in lieu of spooky decor and really any current successful craft projects (my salt dough ornament experiment didn't work out the way I had hoped so I am moving on to sculpey), I will share a semi-spooky personal manifestation board I did several weeks back and a personal ghost story.
Here is my board. I wanted it to be more witchy but apparently I was channeling my inner goth/ vampire that day. There are some witch-ish elements shining through, but mostly it has to do with other aspects of my life. Since we as humans are multifaceted it makes sense. A more pagan-centric manifestation board has been planned to address my pagan goals, but I may just save that for Halloween night, you know since it is the Witch's new year and all that.
On to the ghost story, which Marfi, who hosts Haunted Humpday, kind of inspired. Well, in so much as reminded me with her post, that I can post ghost stories too. Anyway, I am sure that those who have met me physically have heard this story, but those in internet land have not, read it if you wish. This is a personal experience dating back to when I was a very small child...
I woke up in the middle of the night scared, the cold sweat, to scared to make a noise, kind of scared. My bed faced the wall opposite my bedroom window. A street light always shone in and there was also the shadows from a large tree in the back yard. I used to lay in bed and entertain thoughts of a skeletal chicken army marching across my wall, so in some respects the tree plays a tiny part, in that most of what I would normally see, wasn't there. Instead it was blacked out by a black, child-sized figure perched on my windowsill, and it was watching me. I knew it was, its red eyes glowed on my wall, as if the wall was a mirror. It watched me for a few little bit then turned its attention to something outside. Somehow I managed to pull the covers up and hide, desperate and hoping that if I could just go back to sleep it would leave.
I never saw it again. Some might say it was a really bad dream. For awhile I thought maybe it was until I heard an internet radio show hosted by a Shaman. I don't even remember what exactly he was talking about that recalled the memory of this creature, but I e-mailed him and described what had happened when I was younger. His response was that it probably wasn't a dream, that it was probably a creature that fed from children's fear. He had a friend who studies this kind of thing. Of course for the life of me I can't remember what her name was, but how freaking creepy. Now, I don't know how true this could be, because when I tried looking up information on such a creature, I was coming up with nothing. However, I didn't really look too hard or too long. I might do that in the near future.
I didn't know if I was going to be able to do Haunted Humpday this time because I have something going on already for the month of October. That was really stupid of me, because I can totally combine the two!
So for this Haunted Humpday's meager offering, I am going to triple dip and post the two poems that I did for my poetry class and that are being put into the IEPG newsletter.
I know I am painfully late with the last Haunted Humpday post. Part of that is on purpose and part of that is not. Last weekend we had Samhain with the IEPG group, we've had company, and I spent some time with my friend Jen before she moved back to Wisconsin. I also had a new term of school start up this week and we've been very busy getting ready for the Halloween Party at our friend's house. Anyway, the above picture is me in my Halloween costume. I was a vampire sans the teeth (never got around to getting them). I made the shirt from a black knit material and black lace and while I still have to put bias tape (?) on the neckline, I can say it is one of the most comfortable shirts I own. Why? Because it's actually tailored to me! Don't ask about my hair, it's a curly mess and I'd already started sweating and drinking by then.
These were our forks and napkins for the party. It took Amanda asking if we could do this, me trying to do it, and Fiona figuring out how to make the teeth stay for it to work!
Our dessert table has Chris B's ghost brownies, my green coffin cake, and a blue berry lemonade-lemonade-vodka-hibiscus pomegranate vodka punch.
There's Amanda making out with one of my haunted skulls again. She's done in years past.
We had such a good time! A lot of our friends up here came and brought their kids, fur kids included. There was food, drinks, fun, and dancing. The kids had a lot of candy to snack on and after they left, I got pretty drunk. I actually felt pretty good, danced a bit, somehow I ended up on the floor. Apparently Amanda decided she needed to help me out of a chair and I didn't exactly want to go. I also apparently walked up the mirror and looked in it and said "I look like a princess". I don't remember this but everyone else does and they certainly gave me shit about it this morning. It was good fun though. Shenanigans abounded for certain.
This morning was another matter. My back was sure to remind me that I can't move like a normal person no matter how much I want to, and that I have to be careful.
Thank you Marfi for hosting the Haunted Humpday Event!!! I hope to jump in again next year with more fun goodies to share! For now, I am dragging myself to bed so I can do my statistics homework tomorrow.
It's Haunted Humpday again and this time I am getting to it early and starting off with a recent craft. I actually knocked this one out Monday afternoon. I've wanted a larger tote bag in which I could carry some of my bigger craft projects so I made one. And I fell in love with this vintage witch cameo fabric! So did Narcisa.
Of course I had planned to have at least part of my Halloween costume sewn by now but it just didn't seem to happen today. I am hoping production on that starts tonight at the latest. So in lieu of that I thought I would talk about the book I've finally been able to get back to and the show that's been keeping me company whilst I've been sewing and crocheting.
My cousin Shi-Chan strongly recommended The Originals, a spin off of the Vampire Diaries. She said her Grandma watches it and says it's better than the Vampire Diaries. (Which I thought was just getting good since I got caught up on last season) She knew how much I loved Elijah when he was in the Vampire Diaries and I was starting to have a love hate viewer relationship with Klaus. So, after waiting for it to show up on Netflix, I decided to give it a go. I rather like it! Elijah doesn't disappoint and here I am hoping that Klaus can still be redeemed right along with him.
I know I have gushed over Jeaniene Frost's books before but I really do love the Night Huntress Series. This is book 5 of the series and I am really enjoying it. I had to take a little break from it while working on homework and also because there are two spin off books that take place between the previous book and this one.
Other than that, I have been busy working on Halloween goodies. I've created the event page for the Halloween Party we are hosting, put up the invitation, narrowed down what decorations we are taking (we have so few but I am taking nearly all of them which leaves my house a bit bare), and I have created a large playlist of Halloween Music to play at the party. I've also decided on what food we are going to provide. When it was a smaller gathering at our house a few different appetizers were far more manageable, but since we've so graciously been given a different venue, a friend's house, we are doing nachos. It's relatively cheap and simple to do. Apart from that I have a few other little things to do, sewing my costume being the biggest part.
This Saturday the IEPG is having a large Samhain Potluck and Celebration. We are, of course, going and need to take along some food. But I can't, for the life of me decided what I want to take. I was thinking soup since the days are getting cooler but my friend Fiona (who used to be known as Christine B- she's changing her name) is going to take white chicken chili. I would make a dessert but lots of people bring those and we invariably end up with more desserts than main dishes and side dishes. So I am trying to decide between pot roast, my cranberry apple chicken, or one of the recipes I found on Pinterest. It's so hard because all of it sounds so good! Especially right now when its 2 am I am hungry and could really go for a snack. Time for some water and for me to hit the hay.
I keep forgetting to do this: Thank you Marfi for hosting this project!!!
