A Yearbook of Halloween 2007-2008

Many of you know, and if you don't you will now, Halloween is one of my fave time of year, next to my Birthday (LOL) and Christmas. But the reason Halloween is extra special to me is that its also the day my Grandmom was born, her birthday, two fave things in one. She was my other best friend next to my mom, when my Grandma Yolanda passed away in 1998 it was a devastation for me, til this day I have still not fully got over that, she was a second mother to me, both my Grandmom and Grandpa lived with us, when she died we all felt the loss. I eventually bought a plaque at her favorite shrine: St.Joseph's in Stirling, NJ to remember her by, she loved that place, and so do I. My Grandfather and Mother, along with myself take rides over there to see the plaque and connect with her, we just were all there a month ago, it was a happy time.

Today I wish her a Happy Birthday and call upon her to bring me love, luck and Happiness today and always! Another thing about my Grandmother and my Uncle Jimmy, they were the 2 other artists in the family, I believe they passed that on to me. They are my artful idols and like me loved this time of year.

In the next few pictures are an adventure: Tiffany, Ed, Glenny and I made to a local farm in Chester a few weeks back to go apple and pumpkin picking. Isn't this farm beautiful? Just acres and acres of land waiting for you to discover, after all NJ is the Garden State, believe it or not!


Tiffany and I with our massive apples, Tiffany is the best we met years ago at my fave place: The Book Store and have been friends ever since. Here I am in the pumpkin patch, thanks Ed for taking the picture.



Glenny and me in one of the apple tree rows, Glenny is used to the camera now, I take loads of pictures, poor guy, now he just grins and bares it! LOL! Notice this apple tree, don't they look like giant cherries, and that sky was a perefect blue, such a serene picture, I had to take it.

This picture is one I took at Donaldson's Farm in Hackettstown, near my home, such a cute farm and loads of pumpkins and a hayride.

Some more pictures at Donaldson's, of me sitting down in the pumpkin display and my mom behind one of the pumpkin cutouts! We had a blast. These pictures were taken last Halloween time, right on Halloween too!


The next set of picturesque scenery is taken behind Our(Glenny and Me)House, we took a nice Autumn drive along the back road of our house to nab some pictures of the Autumn scenery!


In these pictures, Glenny and I went Pumpkin picking down the road from our house to Tranquillity Farms to hand out at the petting zoo with our new animal friends and the little Goat who wanted to actually leave with us. Isn't this little goat too cute?



Then we went on our pumpkin mission, scooping out the best pumpkins we could find, I detoured over to these cool white pumpkins, they just looked so vintage chic as if painted that color by a vintage artist.

Some primitive looking sunflowers, almost resembled a sunflower grave yard, kinda of eerie but pretty at the same time.
In the next pictures, I dropped down into the autumn flower patch for a fairy style picture, I just should add some wings and a crown, minus the cap.
Talk about the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown, this says it all!










I had to photoshop some of the Donaldson's pictures, I couldn't resist, could you?




These pumpkins were the ones Glenny and I finally bought and carved on Hallows Eve, His is the tree pumpkin and mine is the Sally from Nightmare Before Xmas Pumpkin, took us over an hour to do our pumpkins. The next is a picture of Chris, Jess (my future niece and nephew) in there too cute for words costumes, I glitzed up a bit with a tiny crown, I've had it since I was 7years old. This year Chris is a Sumo Wrestler and Jess a Bee Fairy, Here is my Halloween Costume last year, my altered Queen Costume, The fabric crown is embellished with my vintage buckle necklace and the costume itself loads of pearls and jewels..This year Im dressing as a gothic Marie Antoinette!



Happy Halloween!
Hugs!
Lisa!

The Autumn Snowstorm!


After having a very busy and super exciting weekend, I was ready to get to work, send out orders, back orders, swaps and gifties out, On Monday we lost internet access and the computer was down, on and off all day, everytime I started a new cd order, the system shut. So I said, I will do it tuesday, that didn't happen either, I woke and saw a coating of snow, I was excited, wow, what a sweet surprise. As I was scanning the new images to add to my cd collections I called in my dog:DJ and went to make a cup of coffee, when we heard a loud explosion, with that being said, POOF, we lost power!

Wow, now that was a loud explosion, the snow was piling up, trees were dropping and branches flying all over, hitting the roof and sides of the house. Still, I thought we will have power soon. The optimistic person I am, decided to paint by the window some older un-finished pieces until the power came back. Since I am a Hot Glue Queen, I couldn't finish my pieces or swaps.

Then I thought it is Glenn and Mine's 2 year anniversary, I'll find an outfit for tonight, if it gets worse I'll go to my Mom's to get ready. Well I get a call from her, the power is out here too, then with 2 bars left in my cell, once that dies, I am completely powerless in the house, how do I get help if I need it?
Okay after 7 hours of no power, (no heat, hot water or refrigeration),over 8 inches of snow, a huge tree down missing my car
and light dwindling outside, what do I do? No Glenny and now my cell phone is dead. Finally he arrives home after being detoured from all the main road closures and down trees, around 7pm, we rush out and try to salvage whats left of our anniversary with a trip to Charlie Browns, Glenny in his work clothes and me in three layers, a coat, scarf, gloves and rubber knee mud boats (at least they were my polo specials), no make up and a pony tail, very attractive I assure you! LOL!

After dinner we head over to Lowes and come to find all generators from Home Depot and surrounding Lowes were sold except for 4 left, which all of us powerless folks each bought, after 2 hrs of waiting around..Now you are thinking she now gets power, wrong, this one is broken, LOL..So we bundle up, camp out by the fire with the kitties, the dog, a bottle of wine, a bag of marshmellos, bamboo skewers, an a militia of Yankee Candles, 5 blankets and call it a night.


Turns out we might not get power until Friday or Saturday, even the shopping plaza's are without power except for a few small areas, and now my Mom has power too, thank goodness, I needed to warm up, charge my phone and get to a computer.

Glenny is currently installing a new generator he got on the road today, a $1000 later, they aren't cheap, LOL..Despite all this it will be an anniversary to remember, a good one to tell our future children and grandchildren.

If anyone is waiting on orders, back orders, swaps, etc., please give me some time to get power and into my main computer base. All zine orders should still be on time, as they are shipped directly from the publisher and I can access through my email on this computer. If you have any questions, I will get to them as fast as I can!

Have a Magical and Snow Free Halloween!

Hugs!
Lisa!

A Sunday in the Artful Countryside!

Come and peak inside the world of the Girls from NJ, who all came together for an artful day filled with fun and girl chatter, right inside Linda's Amazing Studio and I mean amazing! In the picture to the left and below is Me, Linda, Bonnie and Deana!

Linda, Bonnie http://bonnieegenton.blogspot.com/
and I met at Ranger and instantly clicked, Deana and I met through Linda, the whole meeting between us all was pure Serendipity, we were all meant to be at the same place at the same time. If you don't believe in Serendipity, watch the movie and eat the ice cream at the sweet spot in NYC, read this post and you will believe.

What do a group of artsy girls do when they get together, have a girly good time, chat, share stories and make a little magic. The following three pictures show Bonnie, Deana and Linda had at work, well playing with their projects, which is a paper fan project I call: The Silver Dollie Fan, where you take an old butter knife and cover it in a piano paper template, distress it, we used Ranger Inks http://www.rangerink.com/ and products layered with a doll image of your choice and fun embellishments. Deana likes to cut paper and decided to burn her edges with a candle for a more distressed look, and an exotic feel, Linda choose a Fairy Sweet Look and Bonnie a vintage doll feel. I opted for the same.



Here is a picture of Linda's Sweet Dollie Piece:

In this picture is Deana's Exotic Vintage Hula Girl Piece:


Now we have Bonnie's Vintage Doll Piece:

Finally we get to mine, the first picture is my piece half finished and the next a picture of the final piece!



While creating, we munched on chocolate chip cookies, coffee and pure excitement. Stay tuned for the next event: My Birthday Soiree Party, Where we are going that day will be a fun adventure!

Hugs!
Lisa!

The Handmade Faire: Highlights!
"Magic and Mayhem, Holly Dollies a must, add some pixie dust, to your Pumpkin doll bust.."
Dolls, Dolls and More Dolls were the basis behind my Halloween Theme this year. Every year around this time I try to do at least one fall show which usually has a different Halloween Theme, one year it was Phantom of the Opera, the next a Faerie Apothecary and one year Pumpkin Splendor, this year was a dollie theme, not too spooky but sweet and vintage. I'm in dollie overload lately, can't get enough dollie stuff to make or buy. Below is a peak into my display in my booth area at The Handmade Faire: http://www.handmadefaire.com/ in Medford, NJ



As You can see in the following pictures I made tons of my most popular hats and crown styles, from the dollie hats, sweet witches hats and the popular cupcake crowns, even my primitive Poofalong Gang of items were on hand.

What made the day so much more exciting and fun was when I was surprised with visits from Miss Suze http://suzeweinberg.typepad.com/ and Miss Michelle http://michellereneebernard.blogspot.com/
http://www.yesterdaystrashart.com/ who came by to visit and play, not to mention meeting the fab Suze aka Junque Drawer Chick (Flickr and Blog)http://junquedrawerchick.blogspot.com/ who came by and bought the sweet Queen Lilly Charlotte Doll, don't worry everyone, I've made more for Silver Bella.


Since it was Suze's Birthday last week, I had a Special Birthday Pixie Hat waiting for her in dark red colors and my fave pink coloring, didn't want to go too pastel on the hat. Here is Suze and I with her hat on.

In this next picture is a sweet little customer of mine whose mom is a talented artist and was a vendor at the show, here she is wearing the hat she bought from me, this one was a fave of mine.

Here I am wearing one of my hats, jsut playinga round with the Dollies, after all, I had to bring some magic in, with all the dim rain and wind outside the Special Show Tent.

Here is a great picture of Michelle and me, she is amazing, such an incredible artist, you have to go on her blog and website to see all the magic she creates, here links are above, truly magical! Did I mention her fave color is pink?

In this picture is a grouping of my new Dollie Mussies, made from vintage school paper, felt, images, Martha Glitter, Vintage ribbon and more.

Now in this picture is the amazing Abbie Galie, http://www.originalabbie.com/ who with her Mother in Law Pola http://www.webmavennj.com/ run this glorious event. Abbie had a fun costume and this great hat which she bought from an artist on Etsy. At the show Abbie bought one of my magic wands to spread more magic around the event!


Near my magical wands were some of my magical witch hats, here is a picture of a few

Now here is a picture of my Mom modeling one of my Dollie Witch Hat Designs, Magical don't you think? My mom is a fabulous Artist who started in the arts with writing and floral arrangements, now she is an avid jewelry designer concentrating on the Romantic and Victorian Side of Jewelry, each with a story of its own. I taught her some basic jewelry design, then after a class and an outing with the glorious Terri Ventura: http://www.dimestoedaze.typepad.com/ Joan aka Aurora-tique was hooked on making more and more jewelry and romantic novelties, available in her Etsy Store: http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=6390013 visit her newly constructed blog and flickr http://flickr.com/photos/31727305@N04/

Here is a great photo of the two Greats: Suze and Joan!


The following are more photo highlights from the event:




Now with that being said, I thought I'd end the day with a photo of me and my fave Witches Hat, made with loads of Spooky Black Feathers!

Have a Be-Witching Halloween!
Lisa!