Pre-Hallowe'en 2020

Last year we moved in October and I practically skipped Hallowe'en; I promised Sam (see the movie Trick 'r Treat) and myself that 2020 would be different and I would unpack EVERYTHING.  And so it begins... 

Of course, Mother Nature is setting the tone and presenting a stunning, traditional launch to my favorite season.  Take a look at those colors!

WOW!  

While some stores seem to have cancelled their Hallowe'en offerings and jumped right into Christmas, I did find a good selection at the Dollarama and other dollar stores.  Zehrs also had some nice skellies, like the dog with the bone and the hummingbird:

And I'm baking, Day of the Dead Bread to start (getting the hardest done first!). Here's the dough before it went into the oven, lovely!  The smell of fresh baking bread with orange zest is something else on a cool October day!

And although COVID19 will butcher trick-or-treating, that doesn't mean we can't have fun this Hallowe'en!  We are decorating, and it looks like some of our neighbours are getting a head start too!  

And here's our house so far:  pumpkin lights and the "oldies" in the windows with one small ghost in the garden bed.  

More to come!  I'm really enjoying opening all the boxes and finding forgotten treasures!  

Cabin and Spring Fever!

So just when it was time to come out of hibernation:  COVID-19!  I'm so bummed, we were really looking forward to exploring our new area and all the wonderful Springtime events, like the maple syrup fests... now we're stuck in our house and getting a little stir-crazy.  The pups are keeping us on schedule, though, and long walks help our mood, as well as some of the wonderful things being shared online, like this: 

When I heard some folks were turning their Christmas decorations back on, though, that made me shiver.  Christmas?!  I want Spring, I want flowers, I want mud and birds and green!  So I decorated for Spring, here are our front windows:

Bunnies!  Tulips!  Sunshine!  If you'd like to do the same, there are hundreds of bunny templates online but you're welcome to use mine.  They are about 20 years old, so I don't recall which ones I hand-drew and which were found online...  for your personal pleasure please use them to spruce up your home with seasonal color and fun!  Just print them on a full sheet of 8.5 x 11 paper and use them as templates on cardstock or whatever paper you have in your home.  

Enjoy!  Shine on!  Stay well, both physically and mentally!

3 days to Hallowe'en!

The most wonderful time of the year!  Hallowe'en is almost here and we're super excited!  Hopefully the weather will be fair so we can set out our cemetery on the front lawn for the first time ever at this house!    

Inside we're properly spooky, to the delight of our guests.  (Okay, maybe the corpse bride standing in the entryway made a few of them jump!)

Here's my wee Halloween tree! 

And in the kitchen:  has anyone tried these new silicone chocolate molds?  WOW!  They work super easy, I'm really impressed!  Look at those screamers!  (They're screaming because they're not long for this earth... dark chocolate with raspberry swirled in guarantees a pretty short life-span!)

Last Saturday, October 24th, the monsters paraded in the 8th Annual Monster March down Metcalfe Street.  The rain held off just long enough for the parade, which was pretty spectacular with about 100 participants and full sidewalks of spectators.  Sadly my camera doesn't take night-time photos very well, but here are a few of Tim Murton's Twilight Zoo critters!  They are roaming about all over Elora and are just amazing!  

Here is the giant Demon King, at least 1 story tall!

You can see much more detail in this daytime photo... what a scary fellow!  

The dancing demons!  Each demon is at least 8 feet tall, very impressive!  Love the motion captured in these critters.

  

This monstrous lizard is on the side of the Elora Legion, look at those teeth and claws! 

My Christmas present

Perhaps you've experienced this:  when you move into a new home, you want to make it yours.  Especially in the spaces where you'll spend the most time you want to make it as cozy as possible, suiting your particular tastes.  So, for my Christmas present I wished for paint.  Yup, paint.  Since it was approaching Christmas and we hadn't yet set up our living room, I wanted to have it painted before we unpacked all the fragiles, hung pictures, etc... and Mom agreed.  Our living room (as opposed to the guests' living room/parlour) was painted a brown/green color, what I snarkily referred to as an army camouflage, which made the whole room seem darker and smaller than it actually was.  We picked something called "Touch of Midas" and hired a painter as we dreaded the ceiling and, like magic, went from this:  

varnish splattered on the baseboards

 and over-painted

and this dark color... to this:

stripes!

No, this was just after the first coats.  

What a change!  

 Eventually we had eternal sunshine:

The new color has just a little bit of orange in it that picks up the color in the pine floor and now it's a room where I look forward to sitting in my comfy chair, basking in the light and reading a good book... someday!  Maybe soon!

I have to say that our painter Ryley Wright did a lovely job, working around our B&B schedule and making the entire process pretty painless.  Thank you, Ryley!