A Little More Halloween-ish Decor...

Thank you so much for your wonderful comments on my last two posts. This will possibly be the last post of my Spooky Decor Tour. I really need to take decent pictures of the sketches and dolls and paintings I'm working on and post those. The Sundial Sisters (myself and Cindy of Vagabond Artistry) have a craft fair coming up in November and we're both burning alot of midnight oil trying to complete things and get ready.
This picture below is my kitchen door... I can't remember where I got the lacy witch panel and it seems like she's been there at least as long as we've been in the house. She welcomes friends and loved ones to come and sit a spell; and she warns off door-to-door salesmen. My happy jack-o-lantern cookie jar. Another wonderful Target find...post holiday clearance. The wallpaper in my kitchen is this awesome 70s orange, brown and ochre pattern. I really love it. So all my accent pieces are orange and Happy Jack looks perfect there.

Yes, this is a vulture on a cow skull. It hangs in the hall next to my front door. I find it amusing and actually, so do most of my visitors and family. The vulture was Halloween decor that never left. I loved it too much. The cow skull...well, I used to live on a formerly very rural road, next to a small family farm. They kept a few cows, chickens and geese and a slew of barn cats. My husband and I loved to go hiking in the woods behind the farm... We found this skull and several other bones on one of our hikes. We actually have three cow skulls from that farm, but this one is the best. At the time that we found it, I was in what I call my 'Georgia O'Keefe period'. I was doing lots of paintings and pastel drawings of animal bones and skulls, so the cow skull was such a prize to me. Sometimes I think my hubby and I have such an odd romance about us. On the table beneath the skull is a bouquet of teasel that he brought me home from one of his trainspotting jaunts. He came in the door and presented it to me, saying: "Here you go Morticia." Much better than chocolates or roses.

Another romantic gesture: this display table was a Christmas gift from him so I could display my animal bones and skulls.(Please know that I haven't gone around killing little animals for their bones or anything gruesome. I find these things on hikes around the local woods. I consider them to be like gifts from nature for my art.) This little case sits in the library and recently, I found a companion for it at the local Habitat For Humanity ReStore. That one holds my shell collection...which is alot less spooky.

This is the fireplace in the library. Library sounds so grand. But really this was a front parlour room or even the 'good' living room. When we moved in we just knew that it would be the room to house most of our books.Someday I will manage to take a decent picture of the shelves, but for now...here is the fireplace. Obviously...the (self)portrait on the mantel is me, surrounded by candles and Jack and Sally votive holders and snowglobes. It's hard to see but, there are little glass Halloween ornaments strung through the leaves and a wonderful carved wooden bat too.
I think this might be my favourite spot in the house, but it's always so hard to choose.

More Frightful Decor...

This "Jane Austen-esqe" bust was from Micheals Halloween aisle a few years back. I have her out year round,usually in the library on a pile of Austen books. This year, for Halloween, I let her wear my Professor McGonagle hat. She looks better in it than I do. The painting is a primitive Hudson Valley landscape that my father did. It's painted on two barn siding planks. This was one of his favourite views to paint...looking down the Hudson River towards Storm King and Breakneck Mountains.

These bony friends inhabit my CD shelf. The skeleton in the back was a clearance find in a funky import shop in Woodstock NY. He's missing half a leg; but I had to have him when I saw him. He looks like the Fluke creature from an early X Files episode--that was one of my favourites and that made me paranoid of port-a-potties forever. I love him. The skull on the wall is actually a mirror.

This is the back of my stove. I love this sign. The tiny cauldron on the stove is from Ireland; full of Irish coins. My parents brought it back from one of their many trips to the Emerald Isle. I collect salt and pepper shakers. I had an aunt who collected them and when I was little we would visit her house and I was always fascinated by all the sets she had. Hundreds. The devils are a salt and pepper set I found at a garage sale.

This isn't a great photo, but I love these gals and their chair. The chair I found in a corner of the attic of this house. I love it's sculptural- ness. I knew it was the perfect spot for these witch dollies.They sit in the upstairs hall. They can watch the comings and goings on the stairs, plus they have a lovely view out the back window. On a clear day, we can see to the Catskill Mountains. They like it there and have told me so many times. They don't even mind the dust.

Halloween Year Round

I love Halloween. I always have. As a child, in spite of having to dress up as either a hobo or a bag of garbage year after year 'because that's what we have for costumes for you'... I still loved it. I secretly dreamed of one day having the best witch costume ever. As a (so-called)grown up I've dressed up as Jessica Hahn(remember her? I won a prize for that one), Galadriel from Lord of the Rings, my version of a Corpse Bride, and--many many times over--as a witch. I technically only get to sport my costume once a year, but my house....well, that's a different story. My house wears her Halloween garb--inside at least--year round. It suits her. It suits me. I like to think that I'm living in my very own Munsters or Adams family house, here in this lovely corner of New York suburbia.


This was a view down the hallway towards the back of my house. I took this picture this morning. No Halloween decorations in sight, but views like this were how I knew my house was suited for Halloween year round

This Day of the Dead style skull was a post-holiday clearance aisle find at Target a few years back. I have four of them--2 orange, 2 white. They're out year round...not always in the front window or the front room. I find them kind of cheerful.

The doorway from my kitchen to the hall. This is a year round display. I especially love my "Witch Is In Casting Spells/Witch Is Out Being Wicked" sign.

I collect teapots. I have alot of them, including several gorgeous autumnal ones, plus a wee jack-o-lantern one from Cindy,my fellow Sundial Sister (http://vagabondartistry.blogspot.com) . This is a favourite. It's such a perfect pumpkin. It's sitting on one of my best garage sale finds ever: a silver cake plate that I got for 25 cents. Seriously. It's a little off kiltre; I think that's why it went so cheaply.

I took too many photos for just one post so, over the next few weeks, til Halloween I'll post them here and there. I really love this time of year.

Jelly Making

Last Wednesday I took my little nephew Brian (the cheeky character in the knit hat, one post down...) to a local orchard to pick apples and 'punkins'. It was a blustery, chilly kind of gray day, but we made the most of it. He led me over hill and dale (literally) picking apples, peppers, pumpkins and 10 pounds of concord grapes. We had so much fun, but once I got home I thought "Oh no. Ten pounds of grapes?"I had it in my head that 20 something years ago, in the early, halcyon days of married life, I'd made a tiny batch of wild grape jelly that actually turned out great. Well, Friday I searched through my cookbooks and found an 'easy' recipe for grape jelly. After a quick trip to the store for extra jars and pectin I set to work. Brian helped, as only 2 year old boys can, by questioning what I was doing at every opportunity and by watching Thomas DVDs to give me the time I needed for the jelly.
This is the pot of boiling jelly...after I'd sorted the grapes to weed out the yucky ones, mashed them a bit and cooked them to release their natural pectin. They then had to be pressed through a sieve to remove seeds and most of their peels. Then 4 1/2 cups of sugar, a dash of lemon juice and a box of powdered pectin and voila! I had to improvise a canning bath, so I used my largest turkey roasting pan, with a cookie cooling rack in it to set the jars of jelly on...filled it with water and used 2 baking sheets for cover. It worked like a charm.

I love the colour of the jelly. It was the most vivid and amazing shade of red-violet. My bamboo spoon is now permanently dyed. I had to take this picture of the jelly pot so I could remember that colour. The smell was pretty incredible too. It just made your mouth water.

And here are the 'fruits' of my labour... 24 4oz jars of jelly. "Mama KK's Great Grape Mess" Jelly.

It's delicious. Esp. on marble rye toast with butter.

So, I think this is how I'm dealing with being an 'empty- nester'. Later this week I'm sending off care-packages to my sons...I'll definitely include at least one jar of jelly for each of them. The rest I'll keep on the counter for a while, to admire...wow. I actually made jelly. And it's good.

O, October......

It's October...the first glorious, beautiful, chill days of October. Why do I love this month so much? All the good things that have come to me as a woman--my marriage, my sons--came to me in the month of September. But October and I have had a kinship that goes way back... Maybe--being a redhead--it's the way that Nature finally adopts my own hues; maybe its the chill of the air and the luxury of cooking and eating squash and apples and pumpkin; maybe it's the most favourite of all my favourite holidays...Halloween: a time of fun and mystery, laughter and a bit of fright; Could it be that the Celtic half of me remembers the ancient celebration of Samhain and still 'sees' this as the New Year? Or is it that I feel most of all, at this time of year, the touch of those loved ones who have passed beyond this earthly life? I feel an urge to set extra places at the dinner table and offer an extra cup of coffee to the Autumn mornings in honor and love to those I miss most. I want to welcome them...in this month when the veil between the worlds in thin; I want them to know they are still welcome in my heart and in my home. I want them to feel the joy I have in this beautiful colourful glorious mysterious month and know that it came from them.

It's October...and I feel on fire creatively. I have so many ideas and inspirations; there is no way I can tend to them all. Everything excites me; it's so beautiful... all of it; the smells, the colours; the chill air; the sky in the daytime; the sky at night; leaves; harvest; pumpkins; gourds; candy; apples; cider;skeletons; ghosts; witches; haunted houses;creepy graveyards;trick or treaters, the fall of leaves ;the fade of the summer colours and flowers...everything. I stop at farmstands and local pick-your-own orchards and pumpkin patches and I want to have as many of the apples and pumpkins and gourds as I can. I can't get enough of them. The pumpkins are always my favourites. I love them; their moony roundness; whether perfect or not; their colour; the feel of them under fingertips or in hand the weight of them. I feel sorry for the ones that get left behind ; passed over because of some 'imperfection'. I want them all. And apples...I can't pick enough apples;make enough sauce; bake enough pies...such a simple and perfect thing.

I'm endeavouring to capture all of this; this feeling and get it onto paper, canvas, fabric, whatever...while it's fresh and full of energy.

It's always been the transition seasons that have held my heart; Spring and Autumn... Summer and Winter are lovely, but there's something about Spring and Autumn. Especially Autumn....especially October...

Lost Summer, Mislaid Camera and Other Travails...

I know I have been away for quite a while; well over a month, at least. Iwas beginning to wonder myself, whether I could find my way back to my blog. My Sundial Sister Cindy told me I was taking a blog-cation; stepping away for a while in order to focus on other things.

Those other things--namely getting my sons off to college and getting our first tuition payments, etc. under our belts--have taken most of the summer. I feel like it was a lost summer...for so many reasons.

My sons and I would always go on wonderful daytrips and adventures when they were younger. Our summers would be filled with everything from trips to The Bronx Zoo and New York Aquarium to hikes on local nature trails and visits to some of the many historic sites that dot our part of the Hudson Valley. On really hot days we'd splurge on matinee movie tickets and soda and popcorn and go see the summer blockbuster--whatever it was.

This summer...they've been holed up in their respective rooms or off with friends. Last weekend we dropped Wyeth off at Champlain in Vermont. Warren has a little over two weeks left before he heads to Philly to start his term. I've been swamped in paperwork and mothering. Getting in my last licks before they truly become the men I can already see in them.

I've also been completely sucked in by the world of facebook. I joined up, ostensibly to keep up with my sons in college and to connect with other college parents and I have been hypnotized by being able to reconnect with long lost friends and the games. Who knew I was a game maven? I now have a few virtual apartments, a few virtual pets; I'm a supermodel and a restaurant owner among other things. It's very distracting and time sucking, but also the perfect easy go-to-spot to destress.

I haven't abandoned creative pursuits. I'm actually pursuing them harder than ever. I have a series of handpainted pressed paper boxes done and another one in progress. I'm painting Day Of The Dead skulls and also doing handpainted ornaments for Christmas. I'm experimenting with materials. I'm also working on a series of simple, hand-sewn prim-style dolls...flower faeries and the like.

I'd have oodles of lovely photos to show you......only I've managed to mislay my camera for the third time this summer. No idea where it is. I had it in hand a week ago; I was taking self-portraits for my facebook photo. I set it down--most probably in some clever-at-the-time spot and now I've been pacing round and round my house looking for it and desperately wishing it had some kind of tracking device on it. I have pictures of my recent painting projects and was intending on posting them.

So.....for now, all I can give you is this texty post reassuring you all that I haven't abandoned my blog or my art.

I promise I'll post pictures as soon as I can. And I won't be away for nearly as long...

Forgive my absence and neglect and forgive my lack of pictures if you can.... (the photo of the rose was taken by my husband...I just couldn't post w/o a picture!)

Giveaway Winner

Hello everyone... I didn't vanish from the face of the earth. I actually had a wonderful trip to Philly with my son; with only the minimum daily allowance of angsty teen. And since we stayed in different buildings and had to attend different programs during the orientation, we were able to 'avoid' each other for large portions of time.
The GPS worked perfectly with only one hiccup-- at the end of the trip it tried to send us into the heart of NYC instead of onto the Thruway North. I ignored it and we made it home fine.
Since the trip, I have been swamped in college preparations and loan paperwork, etc. It's all very overwhelming and daunting and very nearly took all the 'creative sauce' right out of me. I haven't blogged because I've just been plain exhausted. I have all these lists of things I need to remember and/or do and I carry them with me with a click Sharpie in my other hand , crossing things off, adding more things in... I'm back to wanting to find a cave to hide in. **sigh** But the real reason I am here tonight is to anounce the winner of my giveaway. This afternoon I wrote all the names down on paper slips, folded them up, put them in a bowl, mixed them up and had my two year old nephew Brian draw the winning name.

The Winner is............................................purplecat!!!! CONGRATULATIONS.....and thank you to everyone who posted and linked an entry.
I will be in touch--via email--to get your address and info. I'm hoping to be able to get this sent out by the weekend.
I'm also hopeful that I'll have some new art pieces to post by the weekend too. I'm working on some little handpainted boxes and a new doll pattern. Stealing moments here and there.
Until then, I hope everyone is having a wonderful summer. I try to take a moment or two each day to relish the beauty of this season. I have a jenny wren nesting next to my front door; who sings to me every morning to remind me to be in the moment.
Even this craziness, worry and stress is a gift.
I should write that on my list so I remember it.