Blues & Greens

Green weed in Blue window

I needed a bit of blue so these are random shots from my old photo's, and the frozen one is Mr P's.


Blue sky and Rowan from the window


Blue door where I used to walk the dog


Frozen flood water in local fields (thanks to MrP for this one)

Halloween costume ideas - Day of the Dead

-2006
-2005
..-2006
2003

I love Mexican Dia de los Muertos - Day of the Dead. All that colour, art, creativity and food, what a joyous way to celebrate and remember loved ones who have died. Every few years some friends host a Day of the Dead Party instead having a traditional Halloween party. In the early years I started off with simple skulls make-up and a plain red wig but in subsequent years I was inspired by edible Sugar Skull candy and opted for much more colourful face painting and costumes and lots of colourful flowers in my wig to give that true Mexican feel. As always, I did other people's faces first so my own was a bit of a last minute rush, but even messy painting looks jolly when it's in such bright colours. I always enjoy doing them.

Hendrik Kerstens photography

Hendrik Kerstens - Bag


Hendrik Kerstens - Lampshade, Napkin and Paper Roll

Since I was talking about being creative with bin bags I thought I'd show you some of the work of photographer Hendrik Kerstens who photographs his daughter in the style of the Dutch masters. You can read a little about his work and how it began here. His work is another great example of how imagination and creativity can more than make up for a lack of budget and materials when it comes to creating looks and costumes at Halloween, or any other time.

DIY Halloween Lighting Ideas

I like to set the mood at Halloween with home made or customised lighting.


I make paper Pumpkins to work as wall and window decorations, lighting and masks.

• Fairy lights, which are a year round feature, get a Halloween twist with orange paper chain and shreds of orange crepe paper (only on led lights that don't get hot).

• Tealight holders and glass jars get wrapped in orange paper chopped with jaggy tops and grouped to look like little fires.

• Rather than doing scary faces on pumpkins I prefer something more decorative or abstract so that I can keep using them past Halloween.

• Paper pumpkins ensure I still have a spooky vibe on the night. Made from orange paper and drawn on with marker pen then cut out. They look great in the window with tealights behind them (safely in jars) and if you attach two lengths of wool either side they double as pumpkin masks if you have guests who don't have the time or interest to make anything. The one in the photo above is in front of a small table lamp with a 4w energy saving bulb to give a gentle light.

Halloween face painting - elf/goblin/sprite

Elf, Goblin, Sprite? I just painted in a way that suited the ears I'd been given.


A friend gave me her green ears • sitting by the fire

Here I am as a Goblin type of critter in 2005. It was a mild dry October that year so we had the party outside around a tiny barbecue based bonfire with orange tea light lanterns and pumpkins around the garden.


Halloween Invitation 2011

When I was a kid I absolutely LOVED it when we were out Guising (Trick or Treat) and would occasionally go to a house that had made an effort to be spooky. In the 70's it was very rare to encounter that and I vowed when I grew up I'd always dress up for the Guisers. Since Asda in the UK was bought by Walmart there was a definite importing of Halloween as a commercial concept and all the other supermarkets have followed suit so Halloween themed houses are much more prevalent these days, but I far prefer a home-made look rather than a bought one and for me getting creative is the most fun part of Halloween. Having ME has meant not a lot of partying but having had a nice Fancy Dress dinner for 4 last year I decided to increase that this year and tweaked the Elfish Goblin with some fangs to make the above e-vite for it.

Halloween costume inspiration

Junya Watanabe - Commes des Garçons - Autumn/Winter 2008-09

When friends say they don't have anything to make a fancy dress costume with I always remind them that you'll never be stuck for a costume if you have some old tights and a bin bag (panty hose & trash bags). Several of my best, indeed 1 prizewinning, outfits were made with those basics and perhaps some wire or cardboard scraps, or a bit of tinfoil to tweak my own clothes into creations fit for any costume party.

I've had a LOT of fun over the years stretching old tights over shapes to make weird headwear but beware, I found out, to my great dissapointment, that sometimes people think you've made a bad attempt at being Guinan (Whoopi Goldberg) from Star Trek.

The collection above by Designer Junya Watanabe is clearly not made from bin bags and tights, but the effects are similar, albeit painstakingly sewn and crafted, not held together with glue, pins and tape like my 'collections'. The point is that you just need to use your imagination a bit. Costumes don't have to be about recreating something that already exists. Some people may look at you with bafflement if you don't dress as a character but don't let that stop you coming up with something creative and original if you are feeling inspired.

Update: A follow on post shows the work of Hendrik Kerstens who uses a plastic bag to style his daughter like the Dutch Masters.

Free Halloween invite & tutorial

Part of my 2005 Halloween Party Invite (180dpi 15cm wide)

Want to use this to make you own invites?
• Click the invite above to enlarge the black and white image.
• Save to your hard drive.
• Scale to the size you need and print out.
• Colour in the lettering by hand - orange, bright red and green work well.
• Leave it at that and add your details on the back. or read on for the 3D version...

Here is my original mock up (a bit streaky as the ink was running out).

Place party details behind the front flap in contrasting colour


Flip over tabs of different heads on the body.


Wig hand coloured to match the text.

Well, not so much a Tutorial as a 'Look how I did it'. When I made this originally it was actually part of a flip to change card showing the body with my head in various fancy dress outfits from previous years with Jack Skellington as the main one and Ghostly Woman, Dia de Los Muertos Skull and Edward Scissorhands as flip down options simply attached with a bit of Scotch tape at the top, like a hinge. The corners of the flip tabs are folded forwards on the left so you know they can be lifted and and backwards on the right to make the layers stick out a little from each other to give a better 3D look. I cut a slit in the centre of the card so that the text on the front would fold back to reveal party details in a contrasting colour underneath. The Tree and landscape silhouette was from a photo I took nearby and the oversized moon was added in Photoshop. Why not try making one with things related to where you live.

I hope you can have some fun with this or are inspired to try something of your own. I'd love to hear if you do. I hope to post more Halloween inspiration through the week.

Frozen Planet - Amusing Penguin thief

I know I tend not to post video links but my brother sent me this chuckle worthy link of a Penguin stealing stones. Much more amusing than it sounds, mainly because of the way they walk and the shifty guilty way he looks around. I'm not sure if everyone will be able to view it because sometimes BBC things don't play everywhere. It was filmed as part of the new Frozen Planet series with David Attenborough which starts in the UK on Wednesday (26th Oct 9pm BBC1) which I'm sure will be great since the team they have are always dedicated to hanging around for months on end in the most extreme or uncomfortable conditions waiting for the best shots.

And since I'm linking to a bit of animal humour, Simon Tofield (who's first comedy animation several years ago, Cat Man Do, reminded me so much of Mr P's cat) has another one called Double Trouble which is spot on what is was like with the cats I cat sit for when a new kitten was introduced, including the bit where it goes under the rug.

Sarah Anne Johnson - Arctic Wonderland

Sarah Anne Johnson - Explosion - 2011 (via Julie Saul Gallery)


Sarah Anne Johnson - Ripple - 2011 (via Julie Saul Gallery)


Sarah Anne Johnson - Dark Cloud - 2010 (via Julie Saul Gallery)

Sarah Anne Johnson is a Canadian Artist and these pieces are from her Arctic Wonderland series.
It's hard not to feel like winter is rushing up on us which is probably what is drawing my eye to artists depicting places I associate with snow. More gales and rain this week but with a colder edge turning the rain to sleet. Today it's 4c outside and the windchill is -1, brrrr, time for thermal undies (she said, as if she'd not been wearing them all year round anyway because they are comfy).

Autumn chills

Unexpected chrysanthemum bloom like a firework


Achillea, flowering late after a move in Spring.


Aster 'Tonga' unperturbed by foul weather.


The weather has been so bad I've not even planted my Spring bulbs. The few still dry days we've had have been dedicated to getting the house watertight before winter. We started early so it would be finished by October but after discovering part of the house was about to collapse - the 3 day joinery job has now been 3 weeks so far, and there hasn't been time to even think about getting the heating fixed. I'm getting a bit anxious since they are predicting another hard winter. Last year the big snow blast that halted the country arrived in late November. Hopefully this year everyone is prepared and if it happens we'll deal with it in a less embarrassingly pathetic manner. Snowy countries must have thought we were complete wimps since all our news reports made it sound like the most extreme natural disaster had hit us.

Yesterday the rain stopped for a bit and I really wanted to get out planting, but instead I had to rehang a door (no fun having front door and inner door unattached in go around filling all the gaps I found in the walls and windows as the rain or wind came through them the day before. I hate missing the last bits of colour outside, and have hardly managed to get any photo's with the wind so constant, but here are a few of the Autumn flowers in the garden.


Pyracantha berries at their Autumnal best.


Cherry 'Spire' still good on a grey day despite 1/3 of it's leaves being whipped away in September gales.

Other things doing well just now are the flowers of the large Sedums (the 'ice plant' kind), amazing red leaves on most of the Blueberries, gold and orange leaves on the Enkianthus & Amelanchier. The Rowans lost their leaves a few weeks ago (gales again) so there is more light around for the several other annuals and perrenials still in flower like Dianthus, Verbena, Heather, Primrose (they think it's Spring), Rudbeckia, Lamium, Sweet Peas, Scabious, Lychnis and even some Foxgloves.