Musings from Poe's Daughter: a spooky home is a happy home

It's been quite a while without a post for me. I'm not sure why. I've meant to post long before and it just didn't happen. I particularly wanted to make a Halloween post and as such, I have decided that two weeks is not too long overdue. So, without further ado, a look at Halloween this year.

With busy schedules and continuing migraines, I never properly decorated for Halloween this year. Bad bat, I know. Still, I did make sure to get a few decorations put out on Halloween night. The result was a tiny graveyard scene.

As for my costume, I had several different ideas, but in the end, I went with my take on the Phantom of the Opera. It started with this mask:

I added some gloves, a favourite blouse that I found at a thrift shop some years back, and my Azrael's Accomplice Elegant Belle skirt (which I absolutely adore and highly recommend, by the way) and I was ready to go. I worked half a day, handed out candy at home and finally made it out to the club for a bit before turning into a pumpkin. This costume made it comfortably through all of that and I received many compliments on it.

All in all, despite being a bit more low key than I had anticipated (and much more low key than last year's celebrations), I had a wonderful Halloween!

And now, as a bonus, a picture of my Halloween costume in 2003. The skirt for that costume was vinyl, the remnants of my vinyl ballgown from senior prom. Oh how I miss that skirt!

Until next time, darklings!

When my aunt was diagnosed with cancer, she made it clear that she wanted her much-loved home to remain in the family if possible. My parents were looking to move soon themselves and so my aunt left the house to my mum. She passed away in October of 2008.

It's a lovely home, built in the early eighties. Of course, it was also decorated in the eighties; so while the house itself is lovely, the choice of wall colours was far less appealing. Cornflower blue walls in the living room with a muave-and-cornflower fireplace. The master bedroom was painted a colour I dubbed mauvegenta. The walls in most of the other rooms were butter yellow. There was carpet in every room except for the kitchen. Have you ever seen carpet in a bathroom? I have.

Above the fireplace hanged a really awful, vaguely Pollock-esque piece of popart chock full of greys, mauves, tans, and blues. My uncle, who had passed before my aunt, had some interesting tastes in decor, to say the least. Needless to say, there was a lot of work to be done before the move.

Just as Mum and Dad were clearing out the last of my aunt's belongings and beginning remodeling, my then-relationship of nearly eight years came to an end. I left Austin, the city that had been my home for almost seven years, and headed back to San Antonio to stay with my parents. I had initially imagined my stay with my parents would be temporary, until I got back on my feet. But as we began picking paint colours and faucets and light fixtures, we all knew this would be my home too, for years to come.

Over the next nearly two years, while I went through quite a lot of emotional changes, the remodel became a way to sort through those feelings, to express myself, and to channel my energies. Especially the kitchen. The kitchen was my pet project. What began as butter yellow walls and slate grey, vinyl-coated cabinets became voodoo green walls and black-painted cabinets. It took me weeks as I tried various ways to refinish the cabinets. Each time I failed, I had to clean up what I'd done and start at square one. It was long and physically challenging work, but it was my project. When they were complete, even with their flaws, I was quite possibly more proud of those cabinets than I had been of any project I'd ever done before. I put my heart and soul into that kitchen. We all put our hearts and souls into making this house, home, even the friends who came to help paint. There are still details to be attended to, some things left to be done. But each time I look at the walls, the cabinets, the carefully selected fixtures, I smile. This house is itself a love story.

The point of this rambling was to introduce my home and tell its story, as I plan on showing you different aspects of it in upcoming posts. At any rate, tonight I meant to focus on the art in our living room/foyer.

Mum and I picked this out together. We both love it for the same reason. It's a simple painting, just some trees. Nothing frightening and yet the essence of the piece is subtly spooky, evoking a feeling of otherworldliness or perhaps of being in a place out of time.

This is the piece that will soon hang in the foyer adjacent to the living room. It was found in the attic of my parents' old home. We're not certain who it belonged to or how old it is, but I knew it would fit in well here.The frame needs to be redone as it is currently brown and we want black. I love that it too has a subtly spooky feel to it despite being just a simple depiction of an owl. Both are the same tone of sepia bordering on black and white.

Now that the trees are in place and the owl will be in place soon, we've begun thinking of our next piece, the piece that will hang above the fireplace. We want the new piece to have the same feel - nothing frightening and yet, a subtle spookiness, a slight creepiness that you cannot quite place. And in the same sepia, nearly black and white tone. A depiction of an old house seems the perfect fit. I know so many talented artists that when the time comes I think finding someone to take on the project should be fairly easy. It will be a fairly large piece. For now, I've begun looking at "inspiration material" and that in itself is fun.