Halloween Party Ideas

I know it has been about 100 years since I wrote a blog post.

My garden is still plugging along and getting a bit refreshed in the Texas 2nd growing season...I have lots of little red peppers, arugula and a couple of little Fairy Tale eggplant, plus so many happy herbs.

Also, I have continued with my art and craft projects, especially creating and posting lots of stuff to my Zazzle store. I am totally unprepared, but a lot of people seem to be getting ready for Christmas already, and are buying their cards and ornaments, especially popular have been the international Santas, like the Paris, Rome and London cards and ornaments.

But here lately, I have to admit, I have been a bit preoccupied by Halloween. You see, my daughter, who has a mid-October birthday, has decided that she wants to have a Halloween costume birthday party at home. ! What, you mean I have to clean and organize my house?? Actually, I love the idea, and we have been brain-storming lots of cool decorations, foods and spooky activities.

Today, I made this "SPOOKY" Halloween banner, using scrapbooking paper, card stock, a scalloped paper punch, a great font, Elementary Gothic Bookhand, and small black fabric ribbon. Here it is hanging from our antique (past its prime) piano.

I had wanted to make another banner that I found as a free printable on line. I think this person did such a good job in designing this banner, but I just couldn't get it to print right, after selecting landscape a few times, and other options that should make that work with my printer...even tried it with another computer. Alas.

I do have about 2/3s of it printed out  and cut out, so I will ask my computer expert to help me with this.

I spent a ridiculous amount of time today soaking, scraping and scrubbing labels off of various "potion" and "poison" bottles for beverages. Here are some cool sites and resources for printable Halloween bottle labels. The 1st is one of 2 I found at the Graphics Fairy site.

https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEglMbPxI8tg8C0h0AnyIU9vHShyphenhyphen6OVeVU1DRL_b1qgXWi1XFmjXqBL6g3AsSmFr7kQmJVlIDacHCy_IZPeK9RET_XfIwvSKFjJy6nPwFItiuctAqhgX20_3zQFqpegRGaWmzqgTuMBSUb0/s1600/potions+copy.jpg

These are going to be awesome beverage labels for my daughter's party.

Also, I found out the most awesome thing online...but unfortunately, I do not remember what site it was on. If you add a little tonic water to a beverage, then it will glow in a black light. (I'm really excited about this one!)

Well, that is what is going on with us this season. Maybe, I'll post party pictures later. And after that is all over, maybe I will even get around to painting again.

More Small Stories, Mixed Media Collage

First of all -

Happy Halloween!

"Orange Man" carved by Edward

I've just finished straightening up in GIMP some more of the Small Stories series of small collages on poplar wood panels. This batch starts the ones that I made most recently, from mid-September to mid-October. Sometimes it seems that tinkering around with the images to get the colors and everything right takes longer than making the pieces...today is one of those times.

Small Stories 10

Small Stories 11

Small Stories 12

Small Stories 13

Thanks once again to the Graphics Fairy for the vintage hand in the last collage.
This post i linked here.

Halloween Face Paints DIY

Friday afternoon, as R was about to go out the door for the middle school Halloween dance, we decided to do some face make-up or face painting to complete her outfit.

One side of the quicky "extreme" face paint..and my extreme daughter :-)

I just happened to have some paint mixed up in a little container for washes on collage papers that was perfect for the job. This was a mixture of regular artsits' acrylic, or acrylic craft paint would work as well, mixed with a few drops of acrylic glazing medium and a few drops of water. It's about 50-60% paint and went on very smoothly. I'm sure just mixing with water (somewhat less than 50%, I think) would be fine, but a really great way to mix your own face paints is acrylic paint plus about a 1/4 to a 1/3 BABY SHAMPOO. I used to always use this a million moons ago when I painted faces at the big sidewalk sales for the toy store chain I worked for when I was just out of high school. It goes on very smoothly, that's very important with face painting, and why the glazing medium was good, and washes off the little ones' faces after like a dream. This is a great DIY face paint formula. Good for spontaneous face painting urges, or as an alternative to really expensive sets of professional face paints or the thick face "paint" crayons or wax sticks that don't give good fine lines.

BTW, I am now experimenting with kids' glitter glue in the squeezable plastic tubes as a face paint. First off, I'd say, spot testing it on the inside of your wrist is only good if you aren't going to be working and using your hands for a while. Plus, when it is dry, if it's on a moving, bending part of the body, it will crack. It makes a fairly fine line and ..I tried the gold from a 10 tube pack from Dollar Tree...is very shiny and sparkly. The downside: it takes a LOT longer to dry, so little children probably wouldn't be able to keep from rubbing it during the drying time. There is no itching, redness, pinkness or irritation from the glue on my wrist at all. I did get a brand that was marked non-toxic and suitable for kids over 3. Verdict: I'll probably be using this on my face before we go to help out at the kids' Halloween party at church Saturday afternoon, in blue and silver, to match my dollar store wings. Also, don't use it around the eyes for smaller children.

Happy Halloween, Samhain and Storybook Parade

Today's work of art:

Watch out or you'll get hexed.
R as Bellatrix LaStrange
at the school Storybook Parade

I don't have anything new ready to post, but I do have this small collage from a year or so ago in seasonal colors - much more orange than I usually use.

Fabric and paper collage with
acrylic painted papers 5x7

Also, check out my Etsy site for views of Divination, an acrylic on canvas diptych I painted a few weeks ago. (One of the ones I was struggling to photography well the other day.)

May you all get all the candy corn and chocolate you wish for!