Haunted Humpday -- First Signs of Halloween

I recently found Marfi's wonderful blog Incipient Wings. Marfi also loves Halloween a lot and started to organize a weekly event called Haunted Humpday in 2013. Each Wednesday she posts something  that has to do with Halloween. That sounds like great fun, and so I glady join her for the first time today. A couple of days ago I saw this beautiful display of pumpkins at a local garden center. I just love pumpkins!

I usually grow decorative pumpkins in the garden. This year only two of them survived a massive snail attack.

It's quite a challenge to find nice Halloween decoration in Germany, but I was lucky to find a cute LED pumpkin necklace.

As I like the Old West as well as Native American culture, I had a couple of Leanin' Tree cards on display on my walls.

 

Now that Halloween is near, I decided to exchange the pictures for the time being. I chose my Wizard Owl, cute owl scrapbook paper, ...

 ... and my "Not Every Witch Lives in Salem Design."

In the living room, there are more Halloween pictures -- I love the vintage ones.

In my bedroom, I had more Leanin' Tree cards on display.

Now Xenia, the sweetest little witch and friends are spreading a festive Halloween mood.

Some more Halloween pictures, including ...

... my digital ATC titled "Halloween Love."

I also put up some Halloween pictures in my study.

Today I bought my first big pumpkin. It will be a fine Jack O'Lantern. 

I also found a limited Halloween edition (just the design that is) of flavored milk. That is quite unusual for the German market, so I definitely had to buy two bottles.

Happy Halloween indeed!

Lately, I made a KEEP CALM AND TRICK OR TREAT pendant. I am looking forward to wearing it.

I couldn't resist making a Malificent pendant. Malificent is one of my favorite movies from 2014 so far.

If you want to join the fun, be sure to visit Marfi's Incipient Wings blog -- lots of Halloween fun awaits you there.

Happy Haunted Humpday!

Flying Into 2014

For me 2014 feels still brand-new -- full of great opportunities. I hope it's the same for you!

Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving! A special thanks for your friendship and also for leaving comments -- so very much appreciated.

Today is the perfect occasion to thank two lovely ladies for the goodies they recently sent my way. Theresa from Faerie Moon Creations certainly knows how to celebrate Halloween in style. I was the lucky winner of her Witchy Halloween Wristlets Giveaway. The wristlets are just wonderful and have already helped to keep my wrists warm quite a few times.

Theresa sent them in a sweet Fright Night bag along with a tiny broom and black feather.

A tiny black bird was watching over the treasures. He looked just great sitting in my Halloween tree.

I was thrilled to see that Theresa had included candy corn. I had never had the chance to try candy corn before. What can I say? I love it!

Those of you who know Theresa are surely aware that she is a talented artist. I was delighted to see that she included a bookmark showing one of her paintings. I have already put it to good use.

On top of the Fright Night bag I discovered a tiny ornament of a bird in a cage.

Just as the little black bird, it looked fabulous on my Halloween tree.

The goodies were stored in a paper bag with an October 31 seal -- just wonderful! Thanks for all these goodies, Theresa -- I love all and everything!

A couple of days later I found a surprise in my mailbox. Gigi from Sunshine, Lollipops & Butterflies had sent an envelope with two sweet cards. Both of them are now on display in my study.

She also included a few bits and pieces which make a mixed media artist's heart go pitter patter.

Back in March, Gigi showed some of her St. Patrick's Day ATCs on her blog. She offered an extra card for one lucky (not necessarily Irish) person, and lucky me was chosen. So now I was in for a green treat -- this sweet St. Patrick's Day ATC.

Gigi also included a great tag with lots of dimensional elements.

Finally, she also sent a Mardi Gras ATC which -- along with the St. Patrick's Day ATC and Phoenix tag -- now has a place of honor in my study. Thanks Gigi for that lovely surprise letter!

And now -- enjoy Turkey Day!

Happy Valentine's Day

"Who, being loved, is poor?"

-- Oscar Wilde

Painting: "The Storm" by Pierre Auguste Cot (1880)


Happy Valentine's Day!

Chic Freak

Haunted Design House has a new challenge -- Chic Freaks. Since Barb also allows digital artwork, I had great fun coming up with a Halloween-ish ATC. Isn't the little freak just chic?

Cyril & Cedric

Fun with ATCs has a new challenge -- clowns and/or circus. I am not particularly fond of clowns, yet I certainly wanted to create a circus ATC.

Cyril and Cecil were extraordinary artists, and the exotic circus ring drove the audience wild.

Q is for Quote

For Jenny's Alphabe-Thursday I want to share a favorite quote by William Blake with you:

To see a world in a grain of sand,

And a heaven in a wild flower,

Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,

And eternity in an hour.

May joy be around you

I missed Mary's January challenge, so I made sure to join the fun in February! Mary provided a collage sheet with three pictures which I used in the digital ATC below:

May joy be around you

My Top Ten books of 2010

In no particular order, here are my favorite books of 2010:

1. Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger (5/5)
2. Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane (4/5)
3. Prayers For Sale by Sandra Dallas (5/5)
4. The Girl Who Chased The Moon by Sarah Addison Allen (5/5)
5. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (5/5)
6. South Of Broad by Pat Conroy (4/5)
7. The Last Child by John Hart (5/5)
8. To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee (5/5)
9. The Passage by Justin Cronin (4/5)
10. Calamity Jane's Letters To Her Daughter by Martha Jane Cannary (5/5)

It's tough to pick just ten books out of a total of 57 books, especially since I rated 17 books a whooping 5/5 and 25 more a solid 4/5. All in all, a great reading year -- I am looking for more book adventures in 2011. What are your favorite books of 2010? Book talk is always welcome!

Creativity, Happiness, Joy, Magic

The January challenge at We Love Digital Art is "Wishes & Dreams." Isn't that perfect for contemplating what you want to draw into your life for 2011? My digital ATCs call for creativity, happiness, joy, and magic -- I wish that for all of you!

Time

I stumbled upon a new challenge blog titled "Take A Word." From the website:

"The list of challenges which welcome all types of art seems to be shrinking so here's one which may fill in a gap. Each week, on Mondays, a one word theme will be posted. There are absolutely no rules, no rights and wrongs. Just take our weekly word and allow it to send you off into into your imagination."

Sounds great to me! I had fun with challenge # 1 -- TIME -- and ended up with this digital ATC:

"For a dreamer,
night's the only TIME of day."

From the song "Santa Fe" from the movie Newsies

Party

The challenge blog Challenge up your life is celebrating its first anniversary with the challenge theme celebrations. A party certainly is a celebration, and somehow I see a party coming in the near future:

Lady Churchill

Mary from Green Paper has a new challenge and provided a challenge sheet with a photo of Lady Churchill. I wondered who that woman was before she became Lady Randolph Churchill. Jennie Jerome looks a like a woman with a free spirit which could soar like a bird. So here is now Jennie Jerome who became Lady Churchill:

Mabel & Mary

I recently came across Green Paper, the blog of Mary Green who kindly shared a free collage sheet and offered a challenge to use it for a project. I sent Mary a note, asking if it's okay to use the images digitally, and she promptly answered with "Yes! Go for it!!!" While creating my digital ATC, I kept wondering how Mabel Amber and Mary Hayes could be related. Then I decided that they must have been best friends, and that Mabel just loved to write letters to Mary.

Now I would like to ask you for feedback. Would you prefer to see my images and photos in a larger size? Currently, I use the medium-size option -- I started to do that in the beginning of 2010, as details can be seen more clearly without having to click on the photo for getting the original size. It's the size you see above. On the other hand, the largest picture size is shown below.

What do you think? Too big? What do you prefer? I would really love to get your input -- thanks in advance!

Losing Oneself

Art Creations Friday already has its 75th challenge. My digital ATC turned out rather surreal.