angry chicken: screenprinting on fabric made easy (really!). With a discount for EZScreenPrint, a good excuse to try it out.

all buttoned up.: The New Stitch Magazine and My Perfect Cookie.. The thermal pot luck carrier is fantastic!

lovelydesign: perfect boxes + drawer dividers. With instructions.

swissmiss | Inkjet tattoo paper. For DIY temporary tattoos. Must keep in mind for future Halloween projects.

and

plus

or

and

Slightly longer that would be: working out two to three times a week with the 30 Day Shred DVD and/or my Schwinn 430 elliptical machine while watching Gilmore Girls (or How I Met Your Mother) and eating carefully.

The Exercise Bits

I don't want to be outdoors, running makes my knees hurt, it rains a lot here and it's dark in the winter. I'm cranky and ugly when I break a sweat. I'm not motivated by competition or by being around people so a gym was not an option. I know I cannot be the only hermit who needs some exercise, so I'm writing about everything I've done in the hope that it will help somebody else. You can do it! Alone!

30 Day Shred was an easy choice, it's 18 minutes of exercise with a bit of warm up and cool down. By the time I get to the point of either being exhausted or bored it's over. It wasn't easy, and I remember being able to do little more than standing and gasping for air during more than a few sessions, but once I got used to knowing it would be over sooner than later it made me work harder. It's a good mix of strength and cardio and while I frequently swear at the television screen I still use it as my primary work out. I ignored the "30 days" in the title altogether and just did level one until I could get through it without stopping (which was a good long time). Then I'd do the next level and start all over again with the gasping. Levels two and three involve larger motions and are less repetitive, and to me feel like they go by faster. So if level one is making you nuts try level two.

I've written about this before so I'll be brief, I love my elliptical machine. The big point for me about this particular one is this: After trying out a bunch of models I found that the Schwinn 430 (as well as the newer Schwinn 431) have foot pedals that are closer together and create a much more natural stance for me and my short legs. We've had ours for almost two years and we still both use it regularly.

[Click to read much, much more:]

I worked out two to three times a week. I fully intended to work out five days a week but that never actually happened despite my best efforts. On most days I did 30 Day Shred and about twenty minutes on the elliptical machine (or, half an episode of Gilmore Girls). On days when I was particularly sore I would just use the elliptical machine, on days when I was pressed for time I would just do 30 Day Shred, and on days when I was feeling oddly energetic I would race a 22-minute episode of How I Met Your Mother to see if I could do 200 calories before the credits rolled. Note: the calorie counts on elliptical machines are notoriously high, in my case I started thinking of it as just another unit of measure. My machine will display various things and I find it less distracting when I'm not staring at a timer counting down.

I've also come to appreciate how helpful having the right stuff can be. Good shoes, I like New Balance, with these brilliant, heat moldable inserts from SOLE for my fussy feat and arch support needs helped a whole lot. I also use 2, 3 and 5 pound hand weights (using heavier ones when it gets too easy) and a yoga mat for push up and crunches. Most important, though, is a good sports bra. I personally require one that zips up the front because nothing will get me to put off working out more than the prospect of tweaked nipples while pulling on a bra without any closures. Yikes.

The Food Bits

The bits involving food slowly sorted out into simply eating in moderation. Previously I had tried low carb diets and counting calories or keeping track of what I'd eaten in a day. And you know what? All that being aware of food all day drove me crazy. The result was that I grew resentful and obsessive and felt hungry all the time. And then I would eat a whole bag of Doritos. So instead I decided to try to just not think about all that hard. I ate more carefully, more kale less Annie's Mac and Cheese, and smaller meals with more snacks. I started eating breakfast, something I'm not inclined towards, to keep my metabolism going. Slowly I learned how long it takes for me to get rid of sugar cravings (two weeks), and that bagged baby carrots make me ill, and that I really like farrow and kale, and that a little bit of olive oil used to cook a meal makes it far more satisfying than when using one of those olive oil mister things. I cut down on sugar and white flour and beer and eventually started avoiding those things knowing that they would only make me hungry later. Apples and almonds and light Baybell cheeses are surprisingly satisfying snacks, a mug of green tea in the afternoon helps a lot. I ate more carefully during the week and less on the weekends.

Somehow this all worked out into a happy balance, I'm not desperately tempted by a second cupcake because I'm not otherwise denying myself food. I tend to not overeat at one meal because I don't have sugar highs and lows, or when I do have a low sugar moment I don't run straight for the nearest Twinkie. It's still not easy, mind you, and I don't do this all the time. But, I know that I can eat carefully without hating it completely, which makes me feel much calmer.

Evening, post-dinner sugar cravings do get me, though. I found that a single Dove miniature ice cream treat, 60 calories (small but effective), and a big mug of tea will squash it sufficiently that I don't go to bed dreaming about cheesecake. Fruit works too but, well, chocolate is good.

The Weight Loss Bits

It was hard to figure out that I don't have to lose weight at a miraculous pace. Forgetting all about trend/miracle/cleanse/easy diets, I still somehow had it in my head that if I didn't lose a pound a week I wasn't doing enough. I did lose a pound a week for a while and it made me miserable, and circled back to thinking about food too much. At some point I stopped trying for it and eased up a bit and discovered that I could lose half a pound a week without wanting to smash expensive things or sabotage myself. I'm perfectly happy losing weight slowly, it's the pace that works out for me, and once I ditched the one pound a week idea I found I was much happier all around.

I'm a girl so I know my weight fluctuates wildly based on things like the time of the month or if my hair looks good that day. So I weighed myself once a week, before breakfast. People, even with it being gradual the weight loss didn't seem to correspond with anything at all. I have notes that read "WTF?" and point to a week where I knew I ate pizza every day but lost a pound and a half, right next to a week where I did everything just right and gained half a pound. So now I don't pay too much attention. I still keep weekly track but only because it's sort of thrilling to look back at my weight in January as proof.

It feels strange to talk about how thrilled I am with a comparatively slow pace of weight loss in our culture of searching for effortless and miraculous slimness, but I keep in mind that even at this rate I was able to lose weight far faster than it took me to put it on.

The Motivation Bits

I let upcoming events for which I wanted to look good motivate me, I'm not going to claim I'm not vain that way. This year I got married and had pictures taken and saw a lot of family, and went to conferences and saw a lot of friends and people I knew but hadn't met in person and had more pictures taken. I set goals but I didn't set them too high (as in: the conference is in two weeks and I can definitely lose ten pounds by then!).

I also used the old trick of only watching certain shows while on the elliptical machine. I feel twisted about this but it's true: I started looking forward to working out because it's when I got to watch Gilmore Girls. Whatever, it works for me.

Also motivating? Reading about Sundry Mourning losing weight, having a second child and losing all that weight and starting up Bodies In Motivation, all while finding I was still sitting on my couch eating corn chips. I follow a few exercise blogs but unlike those I have no desire to up my exercise routine and train for a race or, damn girl!, finish a triathalon. Nope, I'm happy spinning the hamster wheel on my elliptical. I've run out of Gilmore Girls so I think I'll have to find something new. What do you suggest? I'm leaning towards racing against episodes of Secret Diary of A Call Girl.

I'm excited about our upcoming meeting for the Seattle Grassroots Business Association, we'll have Kaytlyn Sanders of Beneficial Design joining us for a night of Q&A With A Web Designer. She'll be talking a little about how to find and work with a web designer for your business website, but mostly she'd like to take questions. I heard about Kaytlyn through Shauna James Ahern of Gluten-free Girl and The Chef and have since discovered that Kaytlyn has designed a whole lot of websites I read.

The November meeting is also the first one where we'll be charging an entrance fee or taking annual memberships that will be good for all meetings through the end of 2010. We need to do this in order to cover our costs, so far we've been paying for things ourselves and hoping to break even while asking for donations. (Huge thanks go out to people who have donated through the year, you've been the reason we have been able to keep going.) An annual membership also gets you access to the meeting notes we'll be putting on the website. Annual membership is $25, or if you just want to attend this meeting it's $5. We deeply appreciate the support and hope you want to join us next year as well.

Please do RSVP to let us know you're coming. Thanks!

when and where:

Wednesday, Nov. 18th, 7:00 p.m. at the Richard Hugo House
1634 11th Ave, Seattle, WA 98122

The plastic skeleton embedded in an ice sphere was a lot of fun. In a drink it sort of rotated around on it's own and showed different bones, creepy.

On the left are gummy eyeballs I froze in a swizzle stick ice tray I found at Daiso, these were creepy submerged in a drink that had gone opaque (see just below). On the right is black vodka and orange juice, which turned a nicely disgusting greenish beige when mixed.

It took a few tries but I finally figured out how to float vodka in a flute. I filled the glass with juice (or tonic and lime), put in ice, put the vodka in a OXO small measuring cup with a spout and slowly poured the vodka, aiming it towards the topmost ice cube. It usually worked.

On the left is cranberry and vodka and small sphere ice, created in a tray bought at Daiso. The right is blood orange juice and black vodka (which I failed to float properly). There is a gummy eyeball on the end of a cocktail pick. I like the effect of the eyeball at the bottom of the glass. (The gummy eyeballs were from Target and tasted horrible.)

Vodka and tonic before and after mixing. In person it looked a lot more gray than green.

These are Brains! cocktails made in small shot glasses. I had good luck using a pipette to dispense the Irish cream, I dipped the end in the drink and slowly squeezed the Irish cream into the drink while moving the pipette around. I found this technique at Folkinz, which used a straw to a nice effect. The glasses on either side were given small droplets, but didn't look quite as spooky. They looked my like a cocktail that would be named Lymph Nodes!

Here is another skeleton layered inside of a squarish ice cube.

This is a White Russian made with black vodka, turning it a delightfully sickly gray/beige.

I attempted to capture the Frozen Smiles ice floating in tonic and cranberry, it looked creepier in person.

Trivia: the center glass is from Disgruntled Housewife and was aquired in a Smile and Act Nice gift bag from SXSW 2000 or 2001. If you're a knitter you might know Nicole better as the author of Thrifty Knitter (a website) and Naughty Needles (a book), and co-owner of The Harveyville Project (two middle schools in Kansas turned into spaces to encourage creative output, a daring and genius prospect). I've admired Nicole from afar for as long as I can remember, Disgruntled Housewife was one of the first websites I read.

My friend Maggi made these amazing (and delicious) gravestone cookies.

And here is my Halloween mirror picture. I was wearing synthetic hair extensions for the evening, my hair isn't nearly this long:

Hello!

Pear Dumplings · Edible Crafts @ CraftGossip. These are adorable.

What is the gin to rule them all? | Ask Metafilter. Good short descriptions of a number of gins. I'm afraid I'm a big fan of the old juniper berry.

Ultimate Buttermilk Recipe Repository « Pink of Perfection. You know how you buy a whole carton of buttermilk for pancakes and then have a lot left over? This will help you with that.

The Burger Lab: The Fake Shack | A Hamburger Today.

StillTasty: Your Ultimate Shelf Life Guide. Via Shelterrific.

candy_chart. Various temperatures, helpful for degrees of syrup as well as the usual candy stages, at Baking 911.

The world's best pancake recipe. at Kottke

Jell-O Head | Hanttula. A pixelated picture made from a table full of jello shots, I want to use this idea some day.

Irreference » Root Beer Float Pops.

What are some essential horror films for a movie marathon? | Ask Metafilter.

Make me deathly pale! | Ask Metafilter.

RECIPE: Breadstick Bones on Flickr. Cute idea for something savory to serve.

Halloween Food - Meat Head 2 on Flickr. I'm not sure if this is made by the same person but the meat head is one of the things I linked to way, way back in 2001.

earwax on a swab on Flickr. I could not eat this, but I like this idea.

Easy & Expert Recipes For Halloween Fingers | YumSugar. I love the way these are curled around a cup.

Note to self: buy Matthew Mead's Halloween books Halloween Tricks and Treats and Monster Book of Halloween.

Blood and Bones at Joy the Baker. Red hot chocolate and meringue bones!

Ghostly Eggs at Serious Eats. These are so darn cute.

How to make fake blood, at Wired.

This melting head cake is astounding. The whole thing is edible, with cake brains, a royal icing skull, edible eyeballs that popped open and oozed, a layer of red jam covered by frosting skin and topped with cotton candy hair. It was set under a heat lamp and allowed to melt in the most dramatic and incredible way. You must read to the bottom to see the melting pictures, I insist, go go. Bravo!

Zombie jello mold at Geekologie.

Bloody Tooth Cocktail at Martha Stewart, another one to make using black vodka.

Three shrimp cocktail brains: one, two, three.

First I found these gummy eyeballs at Target. They come in their own ice tray, you just add water and freeze.

I went to a Halloween store hoping to find white plastic fangs to embed in ice. Instead I found these teeth molds, called Frozen Smiles made by Fred. I think I like them even more.

I also found these plastic skeleton pieces which are small enough to fit into my ice ball mold from Muji. note: You should not ever put something small into ice that is intended to be put in a drink. Especially not if there are children present. Or drunk adults.

I layered it in the ice of the sphere, making several trips in and out of the freezer. Here is my trial ice sphere floating in a glass of water:

I've seen these same plastic skeletons used to decorate cupakes, here and here on Flickr.

(image from marthastewart.com)

And I intend to try out this eery Lychee eyeball garnish and see if I can freeze it inside of an ice ball. There is another Lychee eyeball at Martha Stewart along with a grape eyeball and this savory option of using radishes and olives. Yikes.

The Altitude Design Summit, a conference geared towards design bloggers. It's being held in Salt Lake City during Sundace and includes a day spent skiing. Sounds fabulous right? If you sign up before Oct. 31st your registration price is $100 cheaper.

If you want to learn to screenprint keep an eye on the itinerant Sparka Screenprinting Workshops. There is a class here in Seattle this weekend at the Phinney Neighborhood Center. It looks like an amazingly complete lesson, well worth checking out. It's also be in a bunch of west coast cities.

apple cider doughnuts | smitten kitchen.

I'm going as the sky. What is a good complimentary costume for my friend? | Ask Metafilter. My favorite suggestion was someone who says "scuse me" and kisses you a lot.

The Son of Man Halloween Costume on Flickr. From the Ask Metafilter thread above.

The Periodic Elements of Style: Hallowe'Etsy!.

Door Sixteen » Etsy wants.. The things from Mudpuppy are creepy.

bat boy lantern lit on Flickr. This is from she who is behind Suspect and Fugitive and Year of Deer, which I love-love.

Poison Labels on Flickr. Via this fabulous use of them by My Paper Crane.

Outside our chamber door on Flickr. I love how simple and effective this decoration is.

Bloody Brain Pannacotta @Not Quite Nigella.

“Bloody Brain Shooters” – Neatorama.

Toasted Pumpkin Seeds at Simply Recipes. Really good advice on what type of pumpkins to use and how to cook the shell-on seeds for the best possible results. Lovely.

I made something gruesome and delicious.

No, really, it was good.

This is meatloaf.

Meatloaf with cheese on top.

And some ketchup.

The nails are made of onion.

The wrist bones are onion too.

Where are you going?

This is how I made it:

Since August I've had a post it note over my desk that simply said "meat hand". I mulled over how to make it for a while. I realized that the old formed inside a plastic glove thing wouldn't work since the fingers would cook so much faster than the rest of the hand. It wasn't until I saw this hand gelatin mold that I had my plan:

I shot several angles to show how it has a base built in, meaning I could probably use it to mold meatloaf.

I made the basic meatloaf recipe from How to Cook Everything using a food processor to chop the onions and carrot to a very fine mince so I could fill in the details of the mold without trouble. One meatloaf recipe using 2 pounds of meat will make two hands.

I sprayed the inside of the mold with cooking oil spray and it came out fairly easily. I put it on top of a rack to allow the fat to run off as it cooked.

I did a few versions, learning as I went along.

Version #1

The first one was straight meatloaf. I surrounded it with mashed potatoes and kale (or brain matter and swamp greens if you have kids, or just act like kids). It looked ok, sort of creepy:

Version #2

The next time I tried adding fingernails made of onion, which were just like press on nails:

To make the fingernails I sliced a thin round off of a single layer of an onion, then used kitchen scissors to trim it into a nail shape keeping the lines in the onion running the length of the nail. I kept the thinnest end of the onion slice at the tip of the nail. (Shown here using a red onion as it's easier to see details.)

I also covered it with ketchup before cooking:

It turned out gross:

This time to better define the fingers I piped mashed potatoes around the hand to define the shape. I just used a ziploc bag with a small corner snipped off to do the detail inbetween fingers, then I snipped off a larger corner to pipe around the hand. I smoothed down the mashed potatoes with a silicone spatula. The results where pretty creepy.

Version #3

The ketchup covered hand made me pretty happy but... I had this idea. My mom used to throw a slice of cheese on top of her meatloaf before cooking it and the cheese always turned out browned and crispy. I wondered how that would work with my relatively delicate hand. I also had the idea to use the smaller inner layers of the onion to create a cartoon-y wrist bone sticking out.

I made two versions. The first used white onion and was simply covered in cheese. The second used red onion and was covered with ketchup and then cheese. I used slices of provolone cheese because I knew it wouldn't slide off completely as it melted. (Maggi suggested it, thanks Maggi!) This time I used the version of meatloaf with spinach, again from How to Cook Everything. Here are some pre-cooked pictures:

I peeled an onion until I got to the smaller inner layers and simply pressed it into the wrist:

I trimmed the cheese to fit around the fingernails:

If I were to do it again I would have put less cheese around the fingers, or rather, I would have put narrower pieces. The cheese pooled inbetween the fingers and made it more difficult to diguise later on.

This cheese thing, it worked a bit too well. We couldn't bring ourselves to actually eat either of them (though, we had been eating a lot of meatloaf lately). Here is a picture showing them side by side. They were cooked at the same time and the one with the ketchup beneath the cheese (white fingernails) browned a bit more. You can also see that piping the detail more carefully can make a difference:

The wrist bone of the white onion was pushed out a bit as the meatloaf cooked:

The smaller onion piece of the red onion write bone wasn't as impressive:

The red onion fingernails were creepier, but the white onion fingernails might get the point across more quickly:

Here is a cute pumpkin pancake chaser:

Just in case you need it.

Welcome to Not Martha’s Trick-Or-Eat post. Today, nine favorite food, craft & lifestyle bloggers await behind nine haunted houses with an array of holiday treats created just for you. At the end of this post, you will find two of these mystery houses. To join in the holiday fun, simply click on one of the buttons and you’ll be linked to the next home on the block. You can also discover all of the Trick-Or-TrEAT contributors and find direct links to their posts at Trick-Or-TrEAT. Happy Halloweening!

These are light and fluffy pumpkin pancakes made extra orange with food coloring and decorated for Halloween breakfast using cinnamon syrup that has been colored a dark black. I'm a bit obsessed with piping spiders onto things. Spiders scare the bejeezus out of me so it's not surprising I turn to them at Halloween.

The pancakes are delicious, I can say this since it isn't my recipe. The recipe comes from Noble Pig, whom I'd like to thank for being bold enough to put a whole stick of butter into the batter. They need to cook a little longer than my usual pancakes and I found they needed a slightly lower heat than I'd normally use or they'd burn before the proper amount of bubbles came to the surface.

I added twice the cinnamon to the syrup and cooked it a little longer to make sure it would be thick enough to pipe. When I took it off the heat my syrup read 213 degrees, just barely over boiling.

Pumpkin Pancakes with Cinnamon Syrup

(Recipe from Noble Pig.com, with a few small changes by Not Martha.org.)

Very Orange Spiced Pumpkin Pancakes

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup granulated white sugar
• 1-3/4 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 egg, separated
• 3/4 cup milk
• 1/2 cup pumpkin puree
• 1/2 cup butter, melted (1 stick)
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
• orange food coloring gel

In a large bowl, flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger.

In a medium bowl, lightly beat egg yolk with a fork. Add milk, pumpkin puree and vanilla; mix well. Add melted butter. If the butter is hot, add it slowly or you will cook your egg yolk. Add a bit of the orange food coloring to the wet mixture at this point. Add more until it's about as orange as you can stand. Stir this mixture into dry ingredients, just until combined.

In another bowl, beat egg white until stiff peaks form. Gently fold egg white into batter.

Heat a griddle or large skillet over medium heat and grease lightly with vegetable oil. For each pancake, spoon about 1/4 cup batter onto the hot griddle. Cook until bubbles appear on the surface and the edges look dry. Turn over and cook until golden brown. The pancakes are delicate so stick to making small or medium sized pancakes, I put cracks in a few larger ones trying to flip them over.

Black Cinnamon Syrup

• 1/2 cup granulated white sugar
• 1/2 brown sugar
• 2 Tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 cup water
• black food coloring gel

In a saucepan combine white sugar, brown sugar, all-purpose flour and cinnamon. Stir dry ingredients together. Add vanilla extract and water. Bring to a boil, stirring occasionally. Be really careful while boiling sugar, keep a bowl of ice water nearby just in case. As it heats squirt in a little of the black food coloring and mix in, add more until it's as dark as can be (it doesn't take much). Allow to boil for a few moments until the mixture has noticeably thickened. Remove from heat and allow to cool enough to put into a squirt bottle (of the ketchup style). You can make it the night before and warm it by dipping the squeeze bottle in a bowl of warm water. You might also have your pancake eaters create their own designs.

Decorate the pancakes with the syrup. By all means decorate the plate with extra syrup. I find spiders, spider webs and bats work out well. Serve with sausages, sausages are creepy looking enough on their own.

Here are some of the designs I tried that didn't quite work as I'd envisioned, a few details, and my first trials. What I'm not showing you is the two small pancakes I meant to look like a pair of eyeballs but ended up looking like a pair of something else, if you know what I mean.

Happy Halloween!

Whooo’s Next? To see what other Trick-Or-TrEAT hosts have cooked up for your viewing pleasure, click on one of the haunted homes below:

Derek Powazek - Spammers, Evildoers, and Opportunists. Via a whole lot of people from all over the web.

Keeping Point-and-Click Adventures Alive - Boing Boing.

On Monday, October 26th I'm participating in Trick-Or-TrEAT event where nine bloggers will be posting something Halloween-y and linking to the next person in the list. It's like an oldey timey webring (are those still around?), or a blog block party. I'm flattered to be in the company of Tartelette, Recipe Girl, Closet Cooking, Dinner With Julie, Sophistimom, Heather Bailey, Kitchen Scraps, and Tongue-N-Cheeky. It's gonna be good so be sure to come see what everybody has prepared on Monday.

Rage Against the Elliptical Machine | Ask Metafilter. A question about why the calories burned on elliptical machines are always suspiciously high.

Effective treatments for SAD? | Ask Metafilter.

I've been hiccuping for more than 24 hours. Help! | Ask Metafilter.

Arts, Briefly - ‘Hitchhiker’s Guide’ Sequel Lands in Britain - NYTimes.com.

shopping losts. A site that turns lost grocery lists into typographic images, via swiss miss.

The 10 cunning ways public radio stations convince you to give them money. - By June Thomas - Slate Magazine.

• Sasha Corset, those ruffles!
• Hooded gown, this would be great to wear while making gravestone rubbings.
• BMovie tentacles, with monster eyes on the hood.
• Pink and black corset dress, just look at that bustle.
• Dr. Horrible costume, awww, he's so wee and so evil.

• Zombified slip dress, for that zombie crawl you're joining in on.
• Dorothy Bustier, it's on sale.
• Halloween headband, love the dangling spider.
• Little Mummy Baby Shoes, I love the one eye peeking out.
• Black Spider Headband, I love that this could pass until you look closely for the spider.

• Trick or Treat Skully Love hair clip, wear it to work.
• Blood Bath Mask, this one scared me.
• Vintage black feather hat, this is gorgeous.
• Plush Angel Wings, I like the cartoony quality of these.
• Muppet Hair Wig, so fun.

• Crocheted Vampire Bite chocker, made of silk and cashmere.
• Voodoo Zombie Dreads Custom Made For you, love these.
• Marie Antoinette Yarn and Ribbon Head Dress, this deserves an very poofy dress.
• Spider Web Umbrella, clever.
• Fire Berry, wet felted scarf.

• My Evil Scientist goggles, c'mon, you know you want to go as Dr. Horrible.
• Knitted witch hat pattern, to felt, I love this tall peak.
• Lobster/Crab Claws, to keep your little one's hands warm.
• Knitted Eye Gloves, giving you something to hide behind.
• Bandana with a mustache, it's still funny to me.

• Exterminate! pin, go as an undercover Dahlek.
• Boris, it's reserved but it's awesome.
• Sol mask, I love how bright this is.
• Cauldron necklace, so cute.
• Boris the spider necklace, the center is cement.

• Black Stitches Choker, no longer available for this year, but I'm keeping in mind for next year.
• Mad Hatter Ring, really great.
• Dead or Alive, fangs you can also fit into your mouth (for your transformation).
• anis estrella, alien necklace, it's a cast of a star anise and it's spooky enough all on it's own
• Grave Dirt Soap, unique hostess gift?

• Gas Mask Necklace, let's face it, what's really frightening us is expressed here.
• Arm Earrings, I like the suggestion that you ripped them off of a magical fairy.
• Finger soaps, that would be so creepy to suds up with.
• Spooky Paper Fortune Cookies, for your party.
• Halloween Party Pint Glasses, hand etched.

• Nosferatu Shadow Vinyl Wall Art, eeek.
• Nail jar candle, delightful.
• Zombie Attack Lamp Shade, oh my god run!
• Spider stained glass placecard holders, simple and spooky.
• Yorick the Mouse Skeleton, sold but so great.

• Dog Trick or Treat, your dog deserves themed food as well.
• Vintage goblet set, these would hold your halloween punch nicely, no?
• Goodie Bags, a download for those last minute party needs.
• DIY Bewitched Black and White Halloween Banner Kit, forigve me but this is delightful and Martha-y.
• Halloween Haunted House Pop Up Card, I love how simple this is.

• Trick or Treat Halloween Banner, nicely aged looking.
• Paper Mums Purple Halloween Mix, for your table.
• Why is a raven like a writing desk? Hand paper cut quote.
• One Inch Skulls Round Seals, to seal the goodie bags.

And here are the items that were featured in my Guest Curator post, kept here as well for the purposes of posterity, and because they're lovely:

• Instant Cemetery, for your table or mantle.
• Little Miss Muffet corset dress, this creeped me out.
• Monster Cereal Bowl, I want to comfort this little guy.
• Bat Wing Neck Corset, stunning.
• Glass bird skull, lovely and spooky.

• Zombies Attack Pack Vinyl Wall Art, oh my god run!
• Tentacle earrings, I love that they are unmatched. How creepy is seeing tentacles sprouting from someone's earlobes?
• Bite Me hand painted shoes, I love these.
• Leaf leather mask, delicate and properly scary.
• Sea Nymph pigtail set, or a perky witch?

• Jurassic Amber Soap, this would make a great hostess gift.
• Autopsy T-shirt, stitched by a former funeral director. Enough said, yes?
• Silver Spider Earrings, lovely and cute.
• The Incredible Visible Man, remember this? Great vintage find.
• Mr. Wonderful finger puppet, he is ready. with his costume.

• Handsoap set, creepy in it's multitude.
• Undead We t-shirt, if you're stuck in line you can pass the time naming all the characters.
• Gothic Halloween download, everything you need for party decorations. Would be great for a last minute Let's Have A Party moment.
• Vintage party tray, so great, so orange.
• Spider temporary tattoos, so creepy when placed on the neck. Or the back of a shoulder, or on your leg just below the hem of a skirt. Shudder.

• Pumpkin Pie truffles, I love the pleasingly plump shape of these.
• Sexy Bats nylons, these look all sold out but I love them and hope they bring them back next year.

If you want more check out Etsy's ever-updating Halloween guides to Costumes, Gifts, Trends and Tricks, Treats and Parties.