Halloween Wanna Be

I only ever wear a witch hat for Halloween. Well, I mean, I wear clothes too, not *just* a witch hat, but I don't dress up like something or someone else. I am what I am, and donning my favorite pointy hat is really all I can do these recent years.

But if I were to get to be someone else for a night, it would have to be the one and only Kate Bush. If you don't know Kate, I have no idea how to introduce you. Not everyone *gets* Kate. But those who do, well...we're never the same.

{Let me just say here, that if you do not like Kate, DO NOT tell me. I seriously don't want to know this about you. If you do love Kate, we're bff's and don't you know it.}

Kate loves to play dress up, and here are some costumes I could choose from for my Night-of-Being-Kate:

This image stuck with me really early on, and I actually have a tattoo that was inspired by Bat-Kate.

But I already have a pointy hat...

Yes, love this hat to death.

Love me some chain maille.

Me-Ow.

Forest Fairy. Yeah, that'll work.

But the Kate I think I'd like to be this year is in the following video. Come to think of it, this would be a gorgeous way to meet her if you haven't made Kate's acquaintance already.

Enjoy The Sensual World...

Felicitous Feather Friends

A huge hug of gratitude to every witch who parked their brooms on my doorstep for my Halloween party- I love all your comments and had a blast visiting your house and listening to your stories and eating your bat-wing cupcakes.

New friends and blogs to follow, and the winners of my Giveaway to announce. I was so delighted by the abundance of visitors that I decided the right thing to do would be to give away more than one Feather Pendant. I will be creating each one for the winner individually, to make them extra special.

And the Felicitous Feather Friends are:

Melanie of Whimsical Creations

Laume of Beach Treasure

Becky of Wilson's Words

***CONGRATS you wonderful witches!***

I'll be contacting everyone to get your goodies to you.

If you didn't win this time, don't be too forlorn- I will definitely be having a Yule giveaway for you to try to get into Fortuna's good graces.

AND I've offered a pendant for Mrs. B's 31 Days of Halloween celebration (day 28), so check out her blog for that and all sorts of awesomeness.

Welcome Witches!

Did Vanessa from A Fanciful Twist send you? Ah, she's a winsome lass to hostess a progressive fete such as this!

Well come and merry meet indeed. I'm delighted you could stop by for a visit and certainly hope you drop in again soon; feel free to leave your broom by the door.

Glad you found my house- no, I don't live in Kansas but as you can see I am somewhere over the rainbow.

I hope you like my party invitation...

...you can see I started donning the pointy hat at a very early age.

And I haven't stopped since.

If you are a sister-collector or lover of Witch Hats, you simply must read my post about these fashionable and ancient forms of headdress.

Since this is the first time you've been to a gathering at my house, I think a tour around is in order. I'm a year-round spooky girl, with silver spider-web curtains, kitchen witches, and fey collections everywhere.

Do you like my nose goblin tissue box? All hail Brian Froud, thankyouverymuch.

When I tell people my living room is held together with duct tape and decorated with crayon, I don't think they believe me. My two year old is quite clever. Ahem.

I have an obsession with a graphic collage I made, Ode to Elphaba. Check out the purse. You can answer the age-old question, "Are you a good witch...or a bad witch?" Guess which side gets virtually no action.

My magical inclination and need for clutter are genetic, apparently. My poor lads.

Here we are at my studio. Seriously, you are only allowed to look at the door and this one corner I have tidied and fixed up. The rest is functional, not pretty or even interesting ;P

I always have some witchiness on this dresser, though there's also usually a huge vase filled with the foliage I use to embellish my hats. I don't keep a serious ritual altar out, the essentials are tucked away in a picnic basket, very much like Dorothy's.

I do collect a doll or two...

My coven sister and I selling our wicked wee hearts out :D

Here's Maleficent, for my sister-witch devotees...

What? You have to fly off? Many other parties to attend...I know, I didn't even serve tea or cakes. But I was just so excited you popped in and there's so much I wanted to share {sigh}.

Well, don't forget your goody-bag!

What's in it? Why, a GIVEAWAY of course!

Yes indeed, I'll be giving away a beautiful feather pendant like the ones in my shop...all you have to do is leave a comment today and let me know you want to be entered, and have an accessible blog profile. For two entries, go ahead and follow my blog (I promise, I won't bite...too hard, at least). The winner will be announced on Monday the 19th.

Loved having you...merry part, and merry meet again!

Listen! The wind is rising, and the air is wild with leaves, we have had our summer evenings, now for October eves!

~Humbert Wolfe

Wellaway Words for Wednesday

Pale, beyond porch and portal,
Crowned with calm leaves, she stands
Who gathers all things mortal
With cold immortal hands;
Her languid lips are sweeter
Than love's who fears to greet her
To men that mix and meet her
From many times and lands.

Algernon Charles Swinburne 1837-1909, The Garden of Proserpine

The Secret of Beauty Circlet

Persephone Dreaming Necklace

Wyvern Words for Wednesday

The Powers whose name and shape no living creature knows
Have pulled the Immortal Rose;
And though the Seven Lights bowed in their dance and wept,
The Polar Dragon slept,
His heavy rings uncoiled from glimmering deep to deep:
When will he wake from sleep?

Great Powers of falling wave and wind and windy fire,
With your harmonious choir
Encircle her I love and sing her into peace,
That my old care may cease;
Unfold your flaming wings and cover out of sight
The nets of day and night.

Dim Powers of drowsy thought, let her no longer be
Like the pale cup of the sea,
When winds have gathered and sun and moon burned dim
Above its cloudy rim;
But let a gentle silence wrought with music flow
Whither her footsteps go.

~ William Butler Yeats

Webs and Words for Wednesday

An homage to the spider energy in my path...literally. These webs, replete with large arachnids were in my back yard; I came across them while taking a break from the spider-themed custom witch hat I'm working on. Special thanks to Peter Ferioli for the fantastic photography. To Unlock the Soul pendant from my shop.

A noiseless patient spider,

I mark’d where on a little promontory it stood isolated,

Mark’d how to explore the vacant vast surrounding,

It launch’d forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself,

Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them.

And you O my soul where you stand,

Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,

Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them,

Till the bridge you will need be form’d, till the ductile anchor hold,

Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my soul.

~Walt Whitman

Bee-Witching Words for a Wednesday

It fell to me to tell the bees,

though I had wanted another duty—

to be the scribbler at his death,

there chart the third day's quickening.

But fate said no, it falls to you

to tell the bees, the middle daughter.

So it was written at your birth.

I wanted to keep the fire, working

the constant arranging and shifting

of the coals blown flaring,

my cheeks flushed red,

my bed laid down before the fire,

myself anonymous among the strangers

there who'd come and go.

But destiny said no. It falls

to you to tell the bees, it said.

I wanted to be the one to wash his linens,

boiling the death-soiled sheets,

using the waters for my tea.

I might have been the one to seal

his solitude with mud and thatch and string,

the webs he parted every morning,

the hounds' hair combed from brushes,

the dust swept into piles with sparrows' feathers.

Who makes the laws that live

inside the brick and mortar of a name,

selects the seeds, garden or wild,

brings forth the foliage grown up around it

through drought or blight or blossom,

the honey darkening in the bitter years,

the combs like funeral lace or wedding veils

steeped in oak gall and rainwater,

sequined of rent wings.

And so arrayed I set out, this once

obedient, toward the hives' domed skeps

on evening's hill, five tombs alight.

I thought I heard the thrash and moaning

of confinement, beyond the century,

a calling across dreams,

as if asked to make haste just out of sleep.

I knelt and waited.

The voice that found me gave the news.

Up flew the bees toward his orchards.

By Deborah Digges