Happy Holidays!

Hubby bought me the two taller figures to go with my little pumpkin head and Jack-0-Lantern. All from ShellHawksCreations on etsy. Best Yule/Christmas gifts! Having a quiet day around the house and will head out for a walk to look at lights soon. I hope you all had a festive holiday season. 

Halloween 2020 Video

Neighbors Jack-O-Lanterns

One of our neighbors uses the shallow carving technique to create beautiful designs. A real treat to see them lined up in the yard. 

The steps

 The little flags by the skeleton went across the steps and hooked on the railing. I think this was after the first batch of kids. Getting ready to put more treat bags out.

The kids and some gown ups were disappointed they could not come up on the porch to visit. It does make me wonder why I wrapped the ball garland with lights and then tinsel. It took hours to unwrap/untangle all of it and store it today. Rain tomorrow and I had hoped to take down the scarecrow and store him only I was tired after taking down all the porch decor.

The day after

It was a busy day getting ready for the socially distanced trick or treating. Blocking off access to the porches and setting up the candy area on the steps. The kids really loved carefully choosing the treat bag design they wanted. The neighbors were decorated with lights and they had a party for their first Halloween in the new house. 

There were only 3 houses with candy sitting out and parents were happy to see all of us so close together. The county health department advised that no trick or treating should take place this year. It was so dark with all the porch lights out. We gave out about 30 treat bags. No one was out after 8:30 so it was a quiet night.

Getting pumpkins ready for storage

 

Skull lace tablecloth drying in the sun

Pom Pom in the road

 

Happy Halloween! Stay safe and spooky tonight.

We won an award

Taking photos tonight I found this award on a pumpkin on the front steps. We apparently missed the judge(s) taking photos with the winners in front of their decor. We sit at the top of a hill so the award is fitting. It looks like e-mails went out to 10 award winners and I found mine in the spam file late tonight.

Is everyone ready for the big day? My fear is we will run out of treat bags quickly with many not handing out candy. We are spacing out treat bags on the lower steps. I still need to make a "take one treat bag" sign with a "sorry we ran out" sign on the back.

Black and Orange

 Love this grouping! Found on our walk tonight. I hope they entered the pumpkin decorating contest.

East side of the house with the projection in scary mode!

Front of the house from across the street.

 

The judging starts tomorrow. I think we are going to call the house done with a few tweaks Halloween night. Blocking off the front stairs and the side deck. Making up treat bags with toys for the younger kids then little Ziploc bags for the later older kids. Stack them on the 3 lower stair treads.

Photos

This is the final version of the porch. The banner/bunting I am working on will be used to rope off access to the porch and yard. Good view of the new paint too! 

Mr. Old Fashion Halloween took photos of the house tonight over a 2 hour period. Hard to pick one photo of the house for the contest. We submitted a view that captured 2 sides of the house. This one: 

 

I believe the judges walk around and look at the houses that submit entries in the neighborhood. First year for the House decoration and or Pumpkin carving contest. The deadline to submit a photo is tomorrow. Sent ours in tonight. The projections running in the windows including a new portrait aging projection show up better on video. Video will hopefully be edited and up a day or 2 after Halloween. Pretty much like we did last year.

 

Shellhawk Goodies

 

Every year I want to buy a Halloween piece from ShellhawksCreations and then forget to go look in time. This years batch of pumpkin people and Jack's is spectacular. Splurged on both this time! Made my Yule list for Mr. Old Fashion Halloween in case any pieces are still around after Halloween.

Scarecrow under the Magnolia Tree

 

High winds and cold. Getting the old boy up last night was a bit of  a project. The magnolia tree is at the beginning of the front porch walkway. He looks pretty good in this spot. The neighbors kept asking if he was going to make an appearance this year. I need to hot glue more moss to his arms/hands. Every year more bits break off!

Front Porch

Porch at dusk. Getting closer to done with this project. The black tinsel garland by Northlight is from Target and is just the right amount of fullness to make the light strings look great! Shiny black that reflects the purple light. The big question is do I have time to make bunting or garland out of some purple owl fabric? Deadline for photo submission is midnight Tuesday to enter the neighborhood contest.

She is like a cat in the night

 and then she is the darkness....

Fleetwood Mac lyrics popped in to my head looking at the lanterns. Black lace draped lanterns with super long fringe. It was getting too dark to see the fringe. Little lace shawl wearing lanterns spinning in the breeze. Made me think of Stevie Nick twirling on stage. Cold moves in tonight with temps in the 30s and then 20s by the weekend.

House Video Preview

We moved the dancing skeletons to the front of the house this year. Took a quick phone video. You can see all 3 couples dancing now like they are on a 2nd floor ballroom. The video was tinted purple to match the porch lights. Trying a layered look on the porch so it looks good during the day and different things are highlighted at night. 

The skeletons are still dancing in the side window tinted purple as well. In theory, and if time permits, we should have a  comical video running on that side of the house to match the same Funkins we used last year. Edit: we have a decaying portrait of a women in the gothic window now.

What the cat dragged in

Fern loves to help decorate! She was also running back and forth across the spandex fabric I was cutting up for projection screens. We moved the dancing skeletons to the front windows so you can now see all 3 couples dance across the 3 windows. The entire neighborhood is getting in the spirit.

Witches

The same great gals as last year only they are all wearing masks! Witches are clever. The neighborhood is starting to look more festive. There is a contest this year for best decorated pumpkin and best decorated house! The year we go low key there is a contest. We also do this kind of thing for a living so I don't know that we would even compete against the 15 year old next door. She is so proud of her purple lights.

The front of our house with the triple windows upstairs will have a projection this year. Fingers crossed we pull that off. It will be the only big new thing. The dancing skeletons are dancing again in the sewing room window. Set up the section of the shelves that all the Funkins rest on. We are so late this year getting things up and running. If you are local I will give a heads up when things are running.

Bat Taper Candles at World Market

 

 

 The bat candles are lovely. The bats circling the candles is a nice effect. 

 

I bought 3 sets of the bats and no spiders. In a dark room they look great. The flicker circuit for a $6 candle is pretty good.

 

My criticisms are the same as the reviewers at World Market.

The candles have a thin wax coating so you have to be careful not to scratch them. The base is silicone to fit various size taper holders. My candelabras have larger receptacles and fit just fine. There is no on and off switch you have to unscrew the base to break the contact with the battery compartment. So, I pull the entire candle, unscrew the base, and then keep the candles in a piece of flannel or felt to prevent scratching. Plan to make little bags for them for storage. The bags meant for storing silver flatware would work.

Autumn Stand

 

We should have taken a drive today before the rain returned to see this stand. Gorgeous work. If we get a break in the weather on Sunday this might be the get out of the house trip! For locals the stand is located at 846 Cascade Dr. NW in west Salem. 

Images courtesy of the owner of the stand.

Lanterns

 

What can I say, lanterns just make me happy! Bold black and white graphics that work for Halloween are hard to find. I wanted to make eyeball lanterns only that would require the right base color lantern and painting it. Then I stumbled across this set. Ordered today. Even if I don't end up using them this year they will make an appearance at some point. 

Noticed heated discussions about trick or treating on my Nextdoor.com site. Similar to the wearing a mask or not threads. Not thrilled that the choice to trick or treat or not trick or treat is now political.

Phrenology Head

My new phrenology head from Michaels. Ordered from the web site and now they are  back in stock.   You might still find it in store. $14.99 and Halloween is now 50% off.

                      

                                         

He looks like he belongs in the cabinet of curiosities. 

The smoke has cleared after an impressive set of thunderstorms. Giant hail with dramatic thunder and lightening. The airing out and washing to get rid of the smell will be a project. The smoke leaves a layer of brown residue.

Purple Globe Lights

 

The purple halloween globe lights as promised.  Photo with dining room lights on and off. The lights are woven through a garland purchased at 90% off from Michael's last year. 

I am pleased with the color and brightness. The plan is to wrap the 30 foot garland to go across the front porch. Swag the lights from the porch roof to complete the look. The only problem is timing. The smoke has set back painting the house by a week and the house had to be washed again. Hopefully the porch will be done in time to decorate! 

      The lights are still in stock at Walmart. 

Fires in Oregon

                                        

 The view from my porch looking to the West Hills of Salem. This was on Tuesday. Fires are burning on the entire west coast. Blanket of smoke across 3 states. 33 current fires in Oregon with a loss of 900,000 acres.

 

                                                        Backdoor view

Photos are from 2-4 in the afternoon. People have been kindly asking how we are doing. We are fine. Salem is the evacuation location for many of the surrounding towns. The state fairgrounds is housing people and animals.

                                              View from my desk

The Red Cross is Taking donations for the thousands of displaced residents. The Red Cross provides hotel vouchers for families. You can designate where you would like your funds to go. Thank You.

Update: Posting a link to a local family who lost so much and the mother is in critical condition. This is their story with a link to a GoFundMe page.  

It is so heartbreaking the loss and devastation. The air quality here in town dropped from Hazardous to Unhealthy today. Salem is still safe. A good reminder of how we all need to have a bug out bag ready just in case a disaster should happen. Cash, paperwork and or USB with paperwork and photos of the interior of your house for insurance, medications, shelf-stable food like granola bars, water, a tarp, and change of clothes. If you have pets have food for them and carriers ready to go. I grew up in CA with earthquakes so we always have bags and carriers ready to go. 

Socially distanced candy slide

 Cute idea for handing out candy. It would save kids having to climb all of our steps. More information and story here. This was the first time reading about Los Angeles having canceled trick or treating. The city did back down to not recommended.  My assumption is by October we should see more cancellations. 

Trying to make the blog more mobile friendly since I am getting more notices from Google. I chose one of the new Blogger templates and the text color choices alone are not great. The first image always shows up giant size. HTML and my memory are not playing well with each other. Hopefully, I can get a friend to help me make the site more attractive. 

Globe lights back in Stock

 The Globe lights last year were a hit for decorating. They look like glass carnival  lights only they are plastic 

Walmart now has the spools of lights back in stock in Orange and Purple. Ordered the purple today and my only fear is the purple might not be bright enough. I'll post a photo when the lights arrive. We used 3 strands of the orange lights on the front porch last year. In case you missed the final Halloween video from last year: 

 

Halloween at World Market

 The only down side with ordering online is sometimes you have to take a pair or set of items. If you like the black and the white palmistry hand then it works out just fine. Good price for the set.

Cute little tea light lantern. Sadly, it is only available in the store.  Thank you to Bruce for letting me know the lantern is now available for shipping. 

Tiny adorable bats on the flameless LED taper candles. The spider set is listed separately. Ordering the bat tapers and will keep you posted on how they look in person. The rest of the Halloween collection is here.

 

Black and Gold Halloween

This lovely Palmistry sign at Michaels caught my eye and then the black palmistry hand. Waited last year and a lot of things sold out. The 50% off sales start so early I decided not to wait. You can find coupons online. This skeleton plate at Joann goes well with the set.

Passed on this amazing snake candle box.  Tenpted to use s 50% off one item coupon only it is hard to tell how good the paint is on the snake. If anyone sees this in the store can you pretty please send me a photo?