Halloween 2012

This year's selection of pumpkins are ready to be gutted.

So, how was your Halloween? After a whole month of planning and decorating we had rain at just the wrong time. It started in mid-afternoon and continued all night. Not that it was really coming down hard, just a fine continuous mist. I'm not really sure if it was factor or not but we only had three groups of trick-or-treaters for a total of eight kids. They all came by car so I'm sure that they didn't get too wet. It was a bit anticlimactic for us though. We were prepared for about twenty or so and now we have all this leftover candy and chips sitting around the house. Who do you suppose will have to eat it all?

Our Halloween display in all its glory!

 We didn't need the kids, we had fun anyway. Hubby was on vacation the week of Halloween so he was able to get all the pumpkins gutted the day before and they had a chance to warm up before carving time. I hate working on them if they have just come in from outside. Brrrrr! We carved five pumpkins this year. I did my traditional "Miss Kitty" and he did an owl, a spider face, a toothy guy and the moons and stars. They took a long time but it was worth the effort. Miss Kitty was the most talked about again this year. Poor Hubby, some day he will carve a pumpkin the kiddies like.

The pumpkin seeds were nice and plump. They made great Devil Seeds!

 

The "October" woodcraft got finished the day before Halloween.

One thing that we appreciated this year was the size of the pumpkin seeds. They seemed to be extra plump for some reason. Maybe the pumpkins were a new variety or maybe it was due to the hot dry summer but the seeds were nice and fat. They made great Devil Seeds. I'll probably be eating them until Christmas!

We've been busy in the craft room again lately. Hubby made this cute October sign from a design we found on the net. It turned out pretty nicely but it was almost November before it got finished. I'll give it another week or so until I pack it away for next year.

I'll leave you with a few more pictures of this year's crew. Bye for now.

Almost ready to go outside for their début.

"Miss Kitty 2012"

"Spider Face" and "The Owl"

"Snaggle Tooth"

Okay, now let's have some kiddies!

Thanks, fellas. You did a great job!

Glowing together for the last time.

In the sunshine the next day.

Spring is coming this week!

The Easter Bunny Says Welcome Spring!

Spring is here already on the Witch’s Island and all the snowmen had to go! Well actually it isn’t truly here until March 20th but I’ve decided that the house needed a spring up-date, RIGHT NOW!! I love to decorate for the seasons and this one is another favorite of mine. Well, okay, they’re all my favourites for different reasons. So the snowmen are all packed away and look what has taken their places. There are bunnies and flowers everywhere! Hubby brought me a beautiful bunch of tulips and they have been displayed in the centre of the coffee to help set the mood.

Two dozen Tulips barely fit in my vase.

A close-up of my Tulips.

This little Easter Bunny figurine is pulling his cart around looking for eggs.

This Easter Bunny is apparently hiding the eggs from the guy with the cart.

This guy looks sweet and innocent but he turns mean when his bowl is full of treats. Watch your fingers!

All Ears stays on the kitchen counter as long as possible.

Man, that is either one giant carrot or two tiny bunnies.

This bunny is on the back of the front door and welcomes us back to the outside world after a long hard winter.

A close-up of the front door bunny.

The All-In-A-Row wall hanging is from Country Feelin'. It has multiple sets of pieces to change back and forth for the seasons and, if you're interested, you can see some of them here. This is a set that Hubby and I made a few years ago.

My spring set for All-In-A-Row.

Spring is also the time that we start to see more wildlife around the Witch’s Island. Last week we saw four foxes in the field just on our way to work. We had an interesting visitor to the backyard, too. We took some fast fry steaks out of the freezer early in the week previous and then for some reason we just didn’t get around to cooking them (shame, shame, shame). After a week in the fridge they were too old to eat so Hubby tossed them out onto the snow for the crows. The crows found them almost right away but so did this Bald Eagle.

The eagle was very nervous about being on the ground in the yard and the slightest movement from us at the windows of the house was enough to send him scurrying up into the treetops. The crows didn’t care though and might have even have appreciated the scaredy-cat behavior of the big bird. They worked as a team bullying the eagle and grabbing as much meat as possible. In the end I’m not sure that the eagle actually got any of the steak but it sure was impressive to watch him flying through the yard. Sorry for the poor qualities of the pictures but these birds are fast and he was a long way away when he was in the trees.

This Bald Eagle apparently loves fast-fry steak, especially when it is free.

He may love steak but not enough to fight the crows for it.

Another nice thing about spring is the smell. You know that damp earthy smell that tells you that the soil is no longer frozen as hard as bullets? Sometimes spring is the smell of skunk or the sign of raccoons walking across the remains of the snow. Sometimes it is the first time that you are able to hang a load of laundry out on the line without it freezing into chunks of plywood. Don’t let the fine weather make you forget about your clothesline etiquette, though. You can’t just hang things out willy-nilly. What will the neighbors think? People are watching, don’t you know.

It is also the sight of the first of your perennials poking through the soil, even if they are being paced by the dandelions and other weeds, or the first time you spot the soil of your vegetable garden poking through the scrum of the snow. A week ago we thought that it would be June before the garden was exposed but it is now visible and getting more so every day.

The dandelions are on the way back, too.

Look! That seems to be garden soil poking out from under the snow.

Unfortunately, Herbie, our garden mascot, didn’t make it to spring. The combination of the violent nature of the fall storms and the miserable conditions of the past winter conspired to rip his poor old head off. He was retired from his post this afternoon. Poor Herbie.

Poor Herbie seems to have lost his head.

Enjoy the pictures and close your eyes. I think you may even smell the signs of spring in the air. Yup, it is just around the corner.

A Perfect Guess!

Another Halloween has come and gone but it was great fun while it lasted.

It’s always tough to figure out how many treats to buy as you all know. We’re lucky that because we live out in the country however many trick-or-treaters there’s going be it is still going to be a pretty small number. The past few years we’ve had just 4 or 6 kiddies so this year, just to be safe, I made up 10 bags. Each bag had a couple of packs of chips and some chocolate and candies. We also had some loose stuff just in case we had a flood of customers but it wasn’t needed. Ten kids were what we planned for and ten kids were what we got. Perfect guess!

Designing the treat bags is a lot of fun.

I like to add handmade tags, too.

Picking out the treats.

Making ten piles to fill the bags.

The treats are ready!

How many kids came to your house? More than you planned for or less? More importantly, what did you do when you ran out of goodies?

Ten treat bags and ten customers, perfect!

I also decided that we would only carve two pumpkins this year mainly because they take so long to get done that the whole day can slip by while the designing and carving operations are processing. Hubby apparently had other ideas and slipped in a third one completing it just a half hour before the first kid arrived. At least it kept him out of my hair while I did some baking. I made a big batch of Devil’s Food cupcakes and iced them with an orange cream cheese frosting decorated with black and purple sprinkles. Used my KitchenAid, too. I also roasted up some of the pumpkin seeds for snacking at TV time.

Devil Seeds are easy to make.

Devil’s Food cupcakes with orange cream cheese frosting, mmm.

Just before the kiddies arrived we rushed around pacing pumpkins and getting the lights set up. It was a lot easier with just the three; we even had time to dig out the giant blow-up spider and set it up on the front lawn. I don’t think anyone was scared or impressed with it though at least no one mentioned him.

My blowup spider finally made it out of storage.

So, as Halloween 2010 fades into memory here is a few pictures of this year’s pumpkins. How many days until the next Halloween?

The Mad Farmer pumpkin in the daylight.

The Mad Farmer pumpkin at night.

The Beaver on Halloween afternoon.

The Beaver at night.

Stars and Moons is becoming a classic here.

The front yard just before curfew.

Good job, guys!

Pumpkins Anyone?

I’m starting to decorate already because we were out driving in the country and look what I spotted. There were lots and lots of pumpkins in every size and colour. Naturally I had to check them all out and give them a though inspection before I chose two (for now). Since that drive I now have 4 pumpkins, they just multiply I tell Hubby.



While we were driving around we stopped a nursery to see their fall mums and we found these goats and their climbing tower. They were more interested in eating their hay than climbing up to see the sights, though. Anyway, I thought you might enjoy some pictures of our little day trip and where I have placed my pumpkins.







I’m sure there will be lots more to come in future posts because Fall (it starts Sept 23) is my favorite time of the year and on that’s the day I start to decorate the inside of our house. Traditions are hard to break on Witch’s Island.