Check out this stunning new digital zine from the creative talents of The Samhain Society, designed by Jackie Cheuvront of Eclipse Afterglow Studios and edited by Miranda Enzor of Spooky Little Halloween, featuring a collection of artworks, DIY projects, recipes, short stories, and more!
I am so honored to be part of such a creative collaboration with the most talented group of artists, writers and creators in the Halloween community. Click on link below or the picture.
Hello, I hope everyone is staying safe, staying healthy and staying home. Even Halloween fans must do their part to help to flatten the curve of Coronavirus, in hopes to minimize deaths and buy our overtaxed health workers a little time to get the crisis under control. Since the situation is so fluid, volatile and a vaccine is over a year away, who knows how this will play out, but citizens have a chance to save the day by staying indoors and doing absolutely nothing. It’s not going to get easier than that.
That said, I bet there’s a whole lot of people out there feeling anxious and stressed by the Covid-19 crisis though, so I came up with a list of things that Halloween fans can do during the quarantine to keep ourselves busy.
Write a Short Story
“Double, double, toil and trouble,
Fire burn and cauldron bubble”
Don’t let anxiety and depression take over your brain! Get those feelings out on paper. Writing under duress sometimes produces the most creativity. Look at Shakespeare, that dude turned out Macbeth, King Lear, Antony and Cleopatra, and dozens of sonnets during the black plague. Yep, it’s true. The Bard of Avon was surrounded by the horrors of sickness and death every day for most of his life, and yet, he spent his time writing about love. I mean, isn’t that what life’s all about? Death and love?
Binge-watch 14 seasons of Supernatural
“The road so far”
Coronavirus has interrupted the production schedule of the CW’s Supernatural, television’s longest-running paranormal show. Maybe 2020 is upset as we are that this is the series finale. It’ll be hard to say goodbye to the Sam and Dean, and their angelic sidekick Castiel, which is why we should binge-watch all 14 seasons now, to mentally prepare for the end! It’s a 15-year story that demands closure. Does anyone even remember why the Winchester brothers are hunting demons in the first place?
Create a Spooky Terrarium
“Life springs from death”
Creating a spooky terrarium is a lot like putting together a Halloween diorama. You get to work with miniatures to create a haunted scene, but somewhere in your terrarium, globe, or glass container is a real living plant. The upside is going green for Halloween is always a good idea. The other upside is if you forget to care for your living plant and it dies, well, a dead plant will fit right in with your theme. Win-win!
Work on your Halloween Smash book
“Something wicked this way comes”
Halloween junk journals are still all the rage. All you need is a journal or notebook, and some Halloween ephemera, postcards, printables, or stickers. There’s no right or wrong way to do it, just follow your heart. Make ’em big. Make ’em small. Get artsy or just manage your collection of pumpkin stickers. Since we never enough time to do all the things we want to do with our smash books, quarantine life is like a gift from Father Time.
Create a Witchy Halloween Playlist
“But the talk got shackled by the howls and the cackles
From the bowels of the Black bayou”
Creating your own Halloween playlist is one of those suggestions that always end up on lists like these, but I’m challenging everyone to get specific. When you’re done creating a witchy playlist, with only songs about witches, make a zombie one, then, werewolves, vampires, okay, apocalyptic tunes to dance to, you get the picture. With any luck, the rabbit hole you fall into should last the entire pandemic.
∴∴∴
You’ll notice I left off reading scary books and watching spooky movies, not because they’re not great ideas to keep our minds entertained and occupied during these surreal and unsettling times, but because those are things you should be doing every day anyway.
Let’s practice good physical-distancing, so we’re all here when Halloween 2020 rolls around this October!🎃🎃🎃🎃🎃
Happy New Year, everyone!
January’s full moon is nicknamed the ‘Wolf Moon.’ It’s believed the howling of wolves could be heard more during the time. Today’s Wolf Moon marks the first full moon of 2020, which coincides with the lunar eclipse.
This is a sign.
Earlier this week, I rebooted the Monthly Haiku Corner. After spreading myself too thin in 2019, and failing to accomplish my goals, I’ve decided not to write weekly haiku. This year, I’m choosing quality over quantity. Although I’m a sucker for monthly holidays and pop culture, I am dedicated to writing darker, more, haunting haiku than before.
I’ve found that writing haiku is a learning process. I’m not the most talented or skilled writer but this is all my heart really wants to do. I love horror and over the years, I’ve started several novels and abandoned them. This year, we answer the call. Only courage can navigate the dangerous waves of fear.
Make no mistake, I am still committed to sharing the love for Halloween, movies, entertainment, and creating cool, spooky original content for this blog. That won’t change. Besides, April marks the second anniversary of Halloween Haiku and I have big plans to celebrate! Plus, I’m already drawing up a game plan for this year’s Halloween. Halloween 2020 falls on a Saturday this year, under a full moon, a blue moon, no less.
Yes, this is truly the year for us selenophiles.
I love a good summer storm. Anyone else? Warm breeze. Dark clouds. Rumbling thunder. Lightning strikes. Can you smell and feel the hot rain?
September is like a good storm brewing. It’s a sexy month. The weather dances the tango with you. The unbearable heat embraces you and swings you around, dizzying your mind, and just when you can’t take it anymore, there’s a cool nip at your nose, keeping you on your toes. You never know what September might be thinking. She’s as tempestuous as the sea, like a wild woman searching for the calm.
September likes to remind us of what we love and who we are. She brings back memories and yearns for new adventures. She makes us lose track of time. We’re constantly dreaming. She sees through the false smiles. She wipes away our summer tears and nudges us to do things that make us feel whole. Do not ignore her.
This is your time. Look out upon the horizon and take in the electrifying light show of last summer storm. Enjoy September. She has so much more to offer than being a pre-month. September doesn’t live in the shadow of October.
September is the lover you wish you could hold onto.
I’ve been struggling with my writing for several days. Weeks, really. The summer blues have had a strangling hold on me this year. I had several ideas on how I wanted to approach this month’s blog post. At one point, I wrote out a long piece about suffering from summer depression. It read like a book report on Seasonal Affective Disorder, and it had nothing to do with Halloween. As my deadline came and went, guilt followed, then, the shame of failure set in, and soon, it was hard to write anything at all, not even one of my goofy movie lists.
Group therapy
I belong to a few Halloween groups around the web, wherever I can find like-minded creatures. Halloweenophiles always seem to find each other. It’s nice not to feel the burden of being the weirdo sometimes. It’s a sure bet, the second Halloween merch hits the stores, people post pictures and store locations. We know how to comfort each other, most importantly, we understand why it’s important to do so, no explanation needed.
Sensing the buzz, off I went, in search of Halloween, looking for pumpkins, skeletons, black cats, and any sliver of orange and black. My local Michael’s did not disappoint.
Australian illustrator Selina Fenech is one of the world’s most popular fantasy artists. She creates beautiful magical worlds filled with fairies, mermaids, goddesses, unicorns and other enchanted creatures. Her art has been featured in books and magazines and is available on licensed products worldwide, ranging from clothing, coloring books, dolls, figurines, jewelry, tarot decks and dozens of other items. She is also a published author of YA fantasy novels titled: Memory’s Wake Trilogy
Artist: Selina Fenech
Website: https://selinafenech.com/
Where to purchase goods: https://selinafenech.com/shop/
Social Media: https://twitter.com/selinafenech https://www.instagram.com/selinafenech/
Selina also offers free coloring pages to her fans on her website: https://selinafenech.com/gallery/free-stuff-for-fans/
Happy March! It’s the month of strange Irish legends, ominous warnings, over-indulgence, abstinence, and all things green.
February got a bit crazy. I missed all my writing deadlines, struggled to find time to work on the site, and much to the chagrin of this Halloween lover, Valentine’s came and gone without being changed into a second Halloween. But, sometimes, you just gotta roll with the punches and there’s no time to mourn February because we’re too busy looking forward.
This month, I’ve got some great haiku, fantastic art, cool movie lists, beautiful photos and lots of yummy Halloween recipes to share with everyone. I love reading your comments, and please, keep on rating those haikus.
In parting, I leave you with this wonderful quote from the Celtic Twilight by William Butler Yeats:
Let us go forth,
the tellers of tales,
and seize whatever prey
the heart long for,
and have no fear.
Everything exists,
everything is true,
and the earth is
only a little dust
under our feet.
It’s November 15th and you’re missing Halloween something awful. It went by so fast. You didn’t see or do half as much as you wanted and to top it off, Christmas creep invaded way earlier than expected. Like it or not, once that calendar flips to November 1st, it’s as if someone pulls the brakes and brings the barreling steam-engine Halloween locomotive to a violent halt. I commiserate with you, my fellow Halloweenophiles. I feel your pain. That’s why I came up with a couple of ideas that might help us ease our suffering.
Look at everyone putting their Christmas stuff up one month early. Well, then, no reason why we can’t take our decorations down one month late! Go ahead and leave your yard haunt in place for another month, and if anyone asks you, why????? Just point to the nearest house covered with plastic santas and fake snow. Nuff said.
Even if the stores are devoid of Halloween items, they still are selling Halloween décor and items online, 50% off or more! The month after Halloween is greatest time to buy the decorations you couldn’t afford during October or stock up for next year’s monster bash.
TRUE! — nervous — very, very dreadfully nervous I had been and am; but why will you say that I am mad? The disease had sharpened my senses — not destroyed — not dulled them. Above all was the sense of hearing acute. I heard all things in the heaven and in the earth. I heard many things in hell. How, then, am I mad? Hearken! and observe how healthily — how calmly I can tell you the whole story.
It is impossible to say how first the idea entered my brain; but once conceived, it haunted me day and night. Object there was none. Passion there was none. I loved the old man. He had never wronged me. He had never given me insult. For his gold I had no desire. I think it was his eye! yes, it was this! He had the eye of a vulture –a pale blue eye, with a film over it. Whenever it fell upon me, my blood ran cold; and so by degrees — very gradually –I made up my mind to take the life of the old man, and thus rid myself of the eye forever.
Continue reading “Poe Sundays”
This October, we celebrate Rhode Montijo, children’s book author & illustrator and creator of curious oddities from Southern California.
Artist: Rhode Montijo
Company/Studio: The Fantasmical World of Rhode Montijo
Where to Purchase Goods: Online shop, comic book conventions, special events, etc.
Website: http://www.rhodemontijo.com/
Social Media: https://www.instagram.com/rhodemontijo/
Why we love them: Rhode Montijo specializes in that vintage Halloween look, where his works truly capture the whimsical innocence of Halloween. When browsing through prints, be prepared for a flood of childhood memories to engulf you and remind you why you fell in love with Halloween in the first place.
Halloween Horror Haiku 
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