Halloween at our Haunted Mansion.

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 We still aren't in full house-living mode, with so many totes and seasonal items displaced. I have only utilized what I have found so far...well, maybe next year?

Thursday I had my monthly doll club meeting, and this is the meeting where everyone goes nuts and brings 3 or more dolls to display in some spooktacular settings. This year was no different. I imagine there were more than 90 dolls at this meeting.

My dolls' seasonal is all messed up, too. I knew where I had one small box full of costumes, and I knew where this doll was and her fantastic dress. I paired her Venetian Muse gown, sans the crazy headpiece, and added a Vampire cape....her accessories are for the Halloween masked Ball, and of course a spare bottle of blood, just in case pickings were slim at the ball.

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Madam Venetian Muse said, "My Dearone, this bottle is near empty, would you like to step into my carriage and I'll whisk you away to my Chateau for a nightcap?!" 

Mrrr aaaa HAahaHA-ha-Ha......!

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Another member's Fabulous Barbie House redone into a Haunted Mansion or Hotel....! all the rooms were full of spooky things and dolls!

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Of course the Bride of Frankenstein is leading the gals outside!'

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Costumes varied from Barbie Western, to classic,  to Skellies!

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Another cute scene were the little kiddies...out for

Trick or Treating! 

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How about Mattel's big American Girls ready for banging on doors for Treats and

        SWEETS!       

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I took Venetian Muse home and she almost looks like she is casting a spell on the toadstool.

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She is so over-the-top dramatic in black and white!

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At home, my Venetian Muse had to land on the Buffet. 

Who could forget that rattling bass voice of Lurch?

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One of the fun things we did at the meeting was make this fabulous Vellum backdrop...some glue and paste as our craft host cut all the paper on a Circuit machine. 

Helen BC is still center stage, but is joined with my artisan gourd cat...so cute.

My mom's antique copper coffee pot, some toadstools, Lurch's bell pull. Who could forget that rattling bass voice of Lurch?

"You Rang.....!" 

I had fun with this, and moved it around until I thought it was done.

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Decorating differently each year is sometimes quite organic and always changing as the season goes along. Remove and add and it will be a quick change to Thanksgiving in a few weeks.

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My monster $Store Spider is just the right touch, they had been destined for the lamp post outside...but the weather has been too cruddy to work outside. 

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Sitting on a artisan pumpkin, HelenBC is perfect for the season

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And the handmade backdrop is spooky for the setting! 

This is all I will be doing for Halloween! 

Hope you are having a 

     SPOOKTACULAR  

      Halloween SEASON!      

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Sandi

Look who just FLEW in on her BROOM: The Witch on my Buffet

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The Witch on my Buffet!

Hi! This year has been disruptive, hectic, and intense. I've been unable to do much gardening, we are surrounded with totes and bins that still need to be dealt with, the house is a fright (having nothing to do with Halloween) and that may be for another two months.

Yesterday a package arrived of a 'great buy'; a doll I didn't even know was being made. One of my favorite actresses, Helena Bonham Carter, arrived a Mattel doll made for the Harry Potter series. Her character is Bellatrix LeStrange...the  insane and dangerous witch vilan-ess.

Apparently she was at her best in the HPotter film, dark, daring, crazy, the perfect part for her. (I confess I fell asleep in the first movie, and haven't seen any of the others) But, the dolls from this series are so interesting. All are fully articulated and actually look like the actors themselves. I love the white bits in her fluffy signature ringlet hair.

Mattel outdid themselves, she is gorgeous. I adjusted her skirt, sheathed her wand, and let her visually cast magic on my buffet which is the only spot really decorated for Fall in our disaster home. 

I just had to share, that I'm decorating a bit, but not really, except for the lovely Witch on my Buffet.

 I may have to see that second HP movie!

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Sandi

 

Fabulous Old Photos and Memories #5: Unexpected Places

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Just one of the hardest things about growing old is the passage of time. Not on a scooter anymore, time zooms by at the speed of a jet plane, maybe a supersonic fighter jet. It's really crazy how fast a week goes.

I'm doing these photo posts...scientifically-chortle by going to my everything folder and saying Eenie, Meenie,  Minie, MO, and opening a folder. I gaze down the stacks of files and clips and randomly choose one. 

So, unexpected places and unexpected memories.

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Just over six years ago, I attended my 50th class reunion.

YES, I'm that old and that's why Time is Supersonic. 

Part of the three-day event was a great tour of my old High School. No longer the sterile, dark, drab green and gray ground stone floors anymore, the school was fresh and bright with wall murals and memorabilia everywhere. Imbedded in the colorless floor was a huge school emblem and elsewhere another uplifting message. 

While touring I looked up....memories flooding around my feet and brain with every step. 

There was my dad....class of January 1941 in a blow up of his yearbook page!

 He was captain of the football team, played basketball and baseball, actually had a scholarship to a State University, but enlisted instead. Our manufacturing city was still suffering the throes of the Depression, and jobs were hard to find, and his family of six couldn't even help with subsidizing a scholarship.

________________________________________

So, he enlisted, 11 months almost to the day of the start of WWII.

________________________________________

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I have many great photos of my dad, so please excuse this blow-up from the picture above.

He served 5 years in WWII in the army as a Technical Medical Sargent in the Pacific.

 He taught me to throw a football, run a wood lathe and a bandsaw, how to swim, how to always be a 'lady', how to drive a riding lawnmower, a boat, hook up down-riggers on Lake Michigan, and most important to never quit anything. 

He doted on my boys...fished and hunted with my husband, and took care of Mom when she was ill, difficult and bedridden. 

That trip to my high school conjured up all kinds of memories, but the strongest was the pride I had for my father up there on the wall

Captain of the Football team 

and of my Heart!

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Sandi

Fabulous Photos and Memories #4

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Fabulous Photos and Memories #4

 

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On the Lake circa 1970's

In 1963 my parent's bought an old farmhouse with 3 strange lots included one directly on the lake inlet. The Farmhouse circa 1850's was my mom's dream---sloping floors, wood stoves, 100 year old trees, original wainscoting and hideous 1930's linoleum floors. PERFECT...lol. Their idea was to use as a summer place and eventually retire there.

Our dock of the family compound is where I stood and took this photo. This corner of the inlet to the huge lake was spring fed---the cold water tickling your legs while swimming. The floating dock my dad built was perfect for fishing and launching our fishing boat. Fishing was fabulous and we had pan-fried fish whenever we wanted.

Old photos bring so many great and sometimes sad memories...this one is almost all great. My parents never got to retire there and sold the cottage in the 1980's. 

Summer vacations, weekends and gorgeous Falls were spent there, Happily and full of MEMORIES.

Do you have photos 

of your favorite childhood Summers?

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Sandi

 

Danish Sandiwiches: Friday Fabulous (Saturday) Photos and Memories #3

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Danish Sandwiches

Do You have Family Memories associated with FOOD?

These are actually new photos of the Danish luncheon I prepared for my cousin and his wife for their Saturday visit.

First of all, my cousin is really my mom's cousin, but he was the last born of his generation, so we were closer in age than he and my mom.

I prepared traditional open-faced sandwiches with the products available to me here in Chicagoland without going MILES away.

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Danish open-faced sandwiches are traditionally made on crustless thin breads, slathered with butter (to keep the bread from sogging) and then heaped with meats, poultry, or seafood. We were only four for this lunch, so I made them all half size and in limited styles.

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I was so disappointed to not be able to get any thin bread at our supermarket with the best choice of European foods. Sadly they have been bought and are slowly trimming away some of their product, now with an emphasis on Italian, Polish, Eastern European and Asian products. 

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This sandwich is thinly sliced ham, stacked on a dark, dark rye with whole seeds in it. Normally it would be a dark pumpernickle. Very tasty with a thinly sliced fresh dill pickle and dill blossom as the condiment.

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Thin sliced turkey piled on lettuce covered sweet white bread is garnished with cranberries and mustard mayonnaise. (The mayo keeps the cranberries from bleeding into the meat--not very appetizing). Normally I would use Lingonberries, but the store no longer stocks them? But, this was delicious!!!

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Next, boiled egg slices on marble rye...piled with thinly sliced tomatoes and garnished with parsley. So simple and so delicious. Other traditional garnishes are wine anchovies, or fish roe.

We also served were two kinds of pickled herring, smoked trout, and a traditional Swiss cheese with crackers. A white wine or beer is also traditional. Coffee was served with fresh fruit (watermelon), fruit sorbet, and butter cookies. 

We were too busy visiting for me to take more photos.

The memories conjured up by this  menu were my teens when I worked for a local caterer and also in a banquet hall. Huge platters of these sandwiches were made early in the day, minus the garnishes. Usually a huge group effort. Lots of fun in a big kitchen.

CATERERS TIP: Plastic wrap is draped all over the platters, then a wet squeezed out fresh dishtowel spread on top, and another layer of plastic wrap.The trayswere then stored in the refrigerator, and quickly garnished just before serving. Even overnight the sandwiches are as fresh as when you make them.

 An older memory is my grandparent's cottage with my mom and aunt helping my grandmother make all the sandwiches, everyone sitting at a long table on the screened porch, skol-ing with beverages, over platters of what seemed like endless sandwiches.

Some other choices were fried bluegills with tartar sauce, liverpostej (coarsley ground liver paste) garnished with sweet pickles or pickled beets, tiny shrimp on homemade mayonnaise and the thinnest possible lemon slices on my grandmother's homemade sweet white bread. Roast-beef medium rare with horseradish sauce, head-cheese (preserved chopped pork parts with peppers,onions in gelatin), herrings, smoked eel, rollepolse (homemade rolled lamb or pork with onions, parsley and seasoning), frikadeller (ground veal, pork fried cakes) with glazed onions...and so many other choices. 

Finale: Back in the 50's, ice cream cups were the biggest treat for dessert of course with pound cake and/or butter cookies. Special events were celebrated with Citron Fromage--a fresh lemon and whip cream dessert or Rhubarb pudding. 

Tak for Festen...Thank you for the Feast!

and my old Family Memories. 

Do You have Family Memories associated with FOOD?

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All the opinions and photographs in this blog are my own, I have not been paid or reimbursed in anyway for my opinions, posts or any products shown. Please do not use photos without linking back to this blog without my permission. Thank you for your cooperation, Sandi Magle

Sandi

Friday Fabulous Photos and Memories #2

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Week Number Two...digging in my old files.

Way back when, maybe three computers ago...Word had this great AP for fooling around with photos. I so miss it.  

    Anyway, my husband's family is from east of Green Bay, Wi. One trip home years ago pre-2009,  I went with my Mom-in-Law to track down some family geneology information with her distant cousin. Her home was really out in the middle of NOWHERE, Wisconsin. But, there were these magnificent Hollyhocks growing on the side of the family's very old clapboard farm cottage.

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I actually don't have the original photo anymore---that was probably lost in the computer switches. I had kept these 3 alterations as documents, which then survived the many system changes.

The above was a straight water color Ap and I remember lightening the entire photo as the siding was grayed with age.

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I really liked playing with textures that were available on that  AP,  everything here looks like stucco.

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Playing with more of the choices, here is a tinted watercolor version...which would go with my decor then. I never did do prints...but these are so charming, I probably should do at least one, now.

The Memory is one of a lovely summer's day...a wonderful conversation, coffee with an elderly family member, and a great day with my Mom-in-Law, whom we all miss and these gorgeous Hollyhocks.

I also miss the free-tweaking Word AP with all kinds of bells and whistles that once came with my old computer  system, which at that time was free with Apple/Macs.

Ha, free software---those were the good-old days!

Do have a beautiful weekend full of 

Family, Flowers, and making Memories.

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All the opinions and photographs in this blog are my own, I have not been paid or reimbursed in anyway for my opinions, posts or any products shown. Please do not use photos without linking back to this blog without my permission. Thank you for your cooperation, Sandi Magle

Sandi