Halloween

Happy Halloween!!

We got a visit from the Great Pumpkin this morning!

It was awesome...loads of candy and toys...

I even got a mooshka doll!

I took Helena to a Halloween carnival and she also

got to visit the zoo to trick-or-treat and see all the 'spooky'

decorations and characters.

Unfortunately she's come down with a cold now..but

at least she had some fun! 

I remember some of my Halloweens being a bit crappy.

with either a cold or some other mishap occuring

just in time to ruin trick or treating.

One time though...I was dressed as a gypsy witch

and we went to a neighborhood that was giving

 great gobs of candy and BOOKS!

one of the books was called 'The Game'

and boy was it scary!!

I eventually read all the books in that series...

I wish I still had them!!!

So what are your plans for tonight?

I've always wanted to go to the 

Winchester Mystery house for Halloween.

There's a website with a list of some super scary attractions here.

Okay, Ive been awake all night

buzzing with sweets and spooky stories.

I'm going to nap

then get ready for tonight.

It's time to get out the old umbrella and jump

 into

 

a new year!

   

 

 

 

Happy Halloween!

Haunted Humpday #10

Hello!

Welcome to our last 

 

I have had so much fun.

Each and every one of you has

inspired me tremendously!

I'd like to share some goodies I received this week

from Ms.Lilypads

She made this beautiful magnet!

 She also sent me some white sage.

Thank you so much!!

I have a few things to
announce now, and by things, I mean 

winners, lol

last week's winner is

beverly e 

I didn't have a chance to upload

the photo of last week's prize..

so here it is:

 

Okay, now the winners of the 

Broomsticks on the Bayou giveaways:

#13 Frosted Petunias won the mask. 

#5 Autumn Wind a mini voodoo doll

#26 Glitter Tart Designs a mini voodoo doll

I need your details please:)

I don't know if you know

but Lisa Kettel is having a blog hop event!

It's going on until the 2nd..

Be sure and visit,

there's lots of prizes!

I created a Dia De Los Muertos dolly

out of one of her Lulu Dolls:) 

I love how she turned out!!

she reminds me of a cookie.

speaking of cookies...aren't these cute!

They're from the grocery store..

We're going to do some baking tonight though...

Lot's of gingerbread skeletons are getting prepped 

at the moment....

we're also going to be using this to make some candy critters.

We also made Salted Caramel apples...!!!

These are SO good!

you make them just like regular caramel apples

but you add sea salt to them afterwards.

You want to know why there's so many goodies?

Well, tomorrow is Great Pumpkin night!!

 (google image)

Ever since my daughter was 3 years old, we've been 

celebrating Great Pumpkin Night 

on the 30th of  October.

It's kind of like Christmas for us.

It started out with a a treat bag full of

candy, a toy and a letter from GP himself.

 Now...

We have a 'party' starting at around 7pm on the 30th

with food, sweets, scary music and games.

at around eleven pm 

we put out the lights out, save for a few candles

in jack-o-lanterns,

and then the stories begin...

At midnight

Great Pumpkin will leave the treats by the front door.

it's usually a cauldron full of candy & magic...

...think of

grandma Aggie's bag in Halloweentown.

Yeah, like that:)

We all dress up too!

Even Magnus has been trying on costumes..

We can't wait!

 I have a couple book suggestions for these long chilly nights!

This one is good for children and adults..

The Young One

The Desrick on Yandro

and Henry Martindale, Great Dane 

are my favorites.

This one has been in my bookshelf for decades I'm sure.

It belonged to older siblings at one point

but I ended up keeping it.

Maybe it's a little silly, but I enjoyed it.

It's all the apocalyptic drama that I like.

 Are you ready?

let's gather one last time.

 I've mentioned that we have an old tool shed in the back yard.

A lot of 'odd' things have happened in and around it.

Sometimes it was unlocked

even after my dad would lock it up.

(maybe he forgot to lock it..maybe not)

I hated when my mom would say

Let's go lock up Pappa's casita

There was a chain leading from inside the shed

that would lead back out and a padlock was put on it.

there used to be another door and the hole where the

chain came through was bigger.

big enough to stick your hand through and pull the chain out.

I had to do that a couple of times...

and I was very sure some cold clammy claw was

going to grab my hand and pull me into the shed through that 

little opening! 

Anyhow..one night we went out

to put the darn lock on the door.

When we got out there, the smell of sulphur

was overpowering. 

My mom uttered some prayer or another, locked the door

and yanked me into the house.

When I asked her what was wrong

she told me that the smell of sulfur meant the

devil was about, and bad things were going to happen.

It was all in Spanish, which somehow sounds way creepier. lol

The next day we had to go to my cousin's baby shower.

I was just a little kid

so everything was super boring for me there.

That is until my cousin brought out a Ouija board

she'd had in her attic (really!) for years.

They asked it silly things, I remember laughter..and my mom's

disapproving look, she refused to touch it and was upset that my

aunt , her sister, was actually playing.

All of a sudden, someone picked up the board 

and threw it across the room.

I guess the board was telling them

horrible things about my aunt..

calling her a widow and asking how

it felt to lose her husband.

We left soon afterwards and I forgot all about it.

I spent that night at my aunt's house..

it was summer vacation

and I usually stayed with her because she was

a teacher and had the same time off as I did.

The ringing phone woke me up at six am.

I remember she ran in and got me to get my shoes on.

We then we went outside to

 wait for my mom to come pick us up.

My uncle had had a heart attack on the way to work.

she got to speak to him, but he passed away late that night .

I never forgot the smell of sulfur in the shed & 

that the board had called her a widow the day before.

 

Our kitchen counter is notorious for dropping bread.

you set a loaf of bread up there and you'll hear a noise

and the bread's on the floor!

Or worse, you don't hear it fall

and then see a certain dog walk passed with 

a bag of bread, thinking it's his lucky day!

It's not just bread either..

we used to keep the fruit bowl there

but oranges and apples would be found under the table

all the time.

There's no real way of explaining it.

My dad, said there must be a damn rat

throwing sheet (that's how he said it) around.

Well we don't have rats, or mice...

what else could it be?

The foundation is even too.

behind our kitchen is a spare room..

the closet lines up with the kitchen counter.

So the back of the closet wall is also the same wall as the kitchen counter.

(I hope I'm making sense)

that closet has always giving me the heebie jeebies.

(My grandfather passed away in that room but that's never bothered me)

One night in 2005, I put a tape recorder by the closet,

turned it on and left for 4hours.

No one else was in our house that night.

The next day I listened to the recording and

I heard a sound...it was after about an hour of

not much..

It was a low moan...deep and full of pain..

I have the recording still, but I couldn't figure out

how to transfer it on here.

I'm also never going to do that again haha!

Maybe our home really is haunted...;)

who knows...the graveyard,

the weird creatures, the noises..

maybe there's no other way to explain it.

The 'Spirits" seem to have moved the giveaway gift

so I can't take a photo of it...

it's a pair of earrings with skeleton girls on them

I know I set them down right here by my laptop!!.

Thank you all for visiting, commenting and being

so enthusiastic about Haunted Humpday.

I'm going to miss it...but rest assured...

I'll be digging it back up next year.

I'll have more stories and goodies for you.

Hope you will join me on the second to celebrate

Dia De Los Muertos.

 

And all of November 

I'm going to host 

a book and a blanket event!

Come back soon to get more details

Big Halloween hugs to everyone!

Marfi

 

spell-a-pa-looza blog hop

It's time for 

 

Lisa Kettell at Faerie Enchantment is hosting this

magical blog hop!

There's going to be inspiration

and prizes everyday!

for more info click here

 This hop is on until the 2nd!

Lisa has tons of awesome ideas and materials

to create some really enchanting projects .

I created a silly little tribute to one of my 

favorite books (authors)

using one of the wonderful products

that Lisa Kettell Designs has to offer.

This is the Violet doll.

She comes dressed in a cute polka-dot gown.

I repainted her and added a few things:)

This is called

Springtime in Venice 

(in case you're wondering, this is a tribute to Carrie)

Come back soon because I'll be having a giveaway

and making more goodies to show you!

Don't forget to visit Faerie Enchantment

and the other amazing blogs that are participating!!!

see you soon,

Something wicked this way comes!

Hi everyone!

There's a blog party being thrown by

Wicked Faerie Queen

called

It's a tour of our Halloween homes.

I'm going to use a few photos of our yard.

This skeleton is actually a wind chime!

It is the greeter at our back gate.

My favorite little ghost.

This creeper is in our front yard.

These lights are above our carport.

ooh! this one floats towards you when you stand in front of it!

There's a few neighborhood kids that are really afraid  of this ghoul, lol

This is the vampire tree.

She's made out of papier mache

The Feral cats out here love this 

little trick or treater.

because it's motion/sound activated

There's an army of these little paper decorations

all over the carport supports.

I love decorating the yard...I used to have coffins, pumpkins

and zombies everywhere, but over the years they

 have worn down, broken or just left..lol

Well, I hope you enjoyed the little 'tour' of my decorations.

Thanks to the 

Wicked Faerie Queen for hosting.

stop by her blog to take a look

at other haunted homes.

goodnight!

Haunted Humpday #9

Hello again!

First off, I'd like to thank everyone that flew out to the bayou this weekend.

I had a huge amount of fun visiting with all of you.

Unfortunately, there were a few parties where I wasn't able to leave comments:(

I'm guessing it has something to do with google+..??

 But I'm not completely sure.

Just hope everyone knows that I did visit

and I enjoyed every spectacular post!

So this is our ninth

Can it be?

This is our second to last!

How quickly has this month gone for you?

It has just sped by for me...

Okay, fun stuff first.

I have a tiny collection of interesting mint tins I'd like to show you.

I have a bat shaped one that I can't seem to find..

This one I bought just for the coffin shaped tin

I love this one so much!

Can't say what the mints actually tasted like,

 they fell all over the floor as soon as I opened it. lol

These mints are good...I thought they would be shaped

like little planchettes.

They weren't.

As you know, I love Dia De Los Muertos.

I was so happy to find this..

The mints taste fruity..

and look how cute the little skellys are!

speaking of skeletons..

Tee from the Crafty Paper

sent me an awesome altered coffin!

 It's so beautiful and detailed..

This is the inside!

plus this ATC!

Thank you Tee, I love it all!

Look what I found at Cost Plus..

It was 2.99.

I think it's a napkin.

This was at Home Goods..She's a USB night light, 

her glitter moves around!

this was only 5.99!!!

Oh! look at this book I found at the thrift store!!!

it's so amazing

There's different sections describing 

what each plant can do..

there's 

dangerous plants,

 intoxicating plants

 and deadly ones.

There's also beautiful etchings in it.

It's so incredibly informative.

If you find this book anywhere

grab it!

 We made some Halloween Brownies tonight

Instead of leaving them square, we used cookie cutters

on them when they cooled off.

We had coffins and pumpkins and a ghost or two..

but they didn't last..

all we had left was the

potion bottle

skull & crossbones

 and a cauldron.

I originally intended to put sticks in them to make cake pops,

but like I said...they didn't make it.:)

Random number generator has spoken and

The winner of last week's prize is

Linda from

 Olde Baggs 'nStuft Shirts 

 I have two stories tonight.

The first one

is about a friend of one of my siblings.

This girl was about seventeen at the time this occurred.

 She was about to leave on a date one night

when her mother stopped her at the door

and told her to make sure to 

 come straight home after the movie...

She'd only just been ungrounded for

missing curfew.

Of course she promised 

then ran out to meet her date.  

They went to watch the movie,

 but left when the second feature started.

 They decided to go driving way out to the edge of town

near the old abandoned pig farms.

It was a place where people went 'parking' sometimes.

But was pretty desolate.

The road there was dirt,  full of potholes and rocks.

Anyhow...they were out there for a while

I guess they lost track of the time..

It was already nearing 3 am when they decided

it was probably time to go home and face the music.

Her boyfriend had been drinking and needed to find a bathroom..

so he just got out of the car and went over to one of the pig pens.

The night was very dark..the pens were just hulking shadows

against the inky sky.

She attempted to fix her lipstick, but gave up

when the interior lights would not turn on.

Still waiting for her boyfriend to return

she tried peering through the darkness

to try and catch a glimpse of him..

all of a sudden he was in the car

 trying to push her down on the seat

he was yelling the whole time for her keep her

head down & not look out the window,

while simultaneously trying to start the car 

He finally got the car going as fast as it would go..

She turned her head and looked out the window..

there was something running
 along side the car.

All she could see of it were it's legs

they were taller than the window and 

as fast as the car was going they till kept up without

any effort.

She tried looking up to see what it was, but it was too big.

It ran with them until they got to the end of the dirt road.

then it stopped.

She gladly accepted her new punishment

for staying out so late, in fact she

didn't attempt to go out for a few months after.

He never ever spoke to her about it..

wouldn't answer any of her questions either.

They stopped seeing each other eventually.

They never got in touch.

But one day many years later, 

she saw him at the grocery store.

after catching up on life tales,

she asked him about it...

She said he paled, then told her it was nice seeing her

and walked out.

I guess the moral of the story is...

listen to your mommy, lol

okay one more...

very short one this time.

This happened out at my aunt's farm.

It was Easter and everyone had gathered
to celebrate.

Well one of our distant cousins

was not behaving and her mother told her if she didn't do as she was

told, she wasn't going on the Easter egg hunt with the family.

(back then, the eggs were hidden in huge bale stacks of hay

about 12 feet high and 30 or 40 feet wide. 

It was also a bit of a hike to get there.)

Well she didn't behave and she had to stay

alone in the house, until the festivities were over.

She did not care...she was bored with all the little kid activity

and wanted to watch tv.She figured eleven was too old to 

look for eggs anyway.

after everyone left

she started watching television.

Hearing footsteps on the porch, she leaned over 

and looked out the window, thinking someone had been sent 

back to stay with her.

There was a man she didn't recognize standing there..

he was wearing a brown suit

and he was smiling.

His eyes were lit up like matches.

He stayed there on the porch just watching her for a few seconds,

then he put his hand to the screen on the window.

She said she was compelled to put her hand to the screen too.

He had long long fingernails.

He used one to poke her finger

sharply through the screen.

She pulled her hand back and saw a drop of blood forming.

the pain was intense.

like the sting of a wasp.

They both looked up when they heard approaching footsteps.

It was her sister, coming to get her so she could look for eggs.

The man was gone.

She kicked up such a fuss that the property was searched by her family

but no one ever saw the man

that stopped to visit.

to this day she still has a scar on her finger

from when he hurt her.

alrighty, that's all for tonight my friends.

My camera has died of battery failure so the picture of the prize

cannot be loaded right now...I'll update tomorrow:)

 

have a great Haunted Humpday!!

 

Broomsticks on the Bayou

Welcome witches!

welcome to,

I'm very happy you are able to join us.

First we gather here to pay respects

to the great Marie Laveau

Leave an offering

or light a candle..

I hope everyone brought their brooms

we need to fly to our destination!

An abandoned mansion will be perfect for a party

Ignore the alligators and other...creatures.

Just come right in.

We prepared some treats for you all.

I don't know about you

but making beignets wasn't going to 

happen for me...so

Helena and I made the short-cut version.

you need some buttermilk biscuits that

come in the little refrigerated can.

powdered sugar

vegetable oil about 4 cups

you can use a deep fryer

or a regular saucepan

heat the oil 

open the container of the biscuits

(I have an unnatural fear of these dumb things, lol)

drop a raw biscuit carefully into the hot oil

 

they brown up fast, about 30 seconds or so...

when it's done,

  put it on a paper towel lined plate.

Add powdered sugar to the tops.

They are amazing!

We couldn't stop eating them...

Don't worry, I saved some for you.

We also made edible voodoo dolls.

sugar cookie dough can be molded

into little figures.
Then decorated with cookie icing.
Or you can use some
leftover biscuits:)

 

They are very tasty!

Now let's make some drinks!
Since I don't drink very much I thought
 a mocktail would be nice.
You need these ingredients for
 a non-alcoholic 
 Hurricane
2 oz orange juice 

2 oz cranberry juice

 1 oz grapefruit juice

 1 oz apple juice

 crushed ice

 orange, lemon or lime slice

 

 

Now what fun would our party be if there wasn't 

spells and magic flying around?

 You can go here 

to find some simple spells.

 

Have you had your palm read yet?

 

 or made a voodoo doll?

I have the directions here.

This is a new one.
Can't have too many you know.

maybe you want to make yourself a gris gris bag!

there's a really neat website that shows
you how, just click here.



I made a voodoo queen crown!

and some goodies to give away...
a masquerade mask 

and some little voodoo dolls for your very own!

Now let's go outside and admire
the gorgeous hunter's moon for a while.

I can't tell you how much I appreciate
you coming along on this little adventure.
Thank you to Anna from Frosted Petunias
for indulging me.

Leave me a comment and your party link
to have a chance of winning a prize..
remember,
if you didn't have a party
it's ok
your name still goes into a hat.

Okay... now it's time for dancing!!
let's go back inside.