A Halloween and Christmas Switcheroo!

I hope you all had a Merry Christmas! I was surprised to actually get my wish and have a Christmas with Halloween weather after having a Halloween with Christmas weather! I know we all had unusual weather this past Halloween. In my case, that meant a good amount of snow. As for Christmas, I was treated to a sunny day that was in the 60s - at least where the sun had collected on the porch. I had a tiny bit of time to enjoy that porch on Christmas and I did so with a Halloween book.

The inside cover:

Someone I follow on Tumblr had shared this book and said it was the best Halloween book they'd read in years. So I checked to see if it was in our library system and was surprised to see that it was! The librarian I checked this out from said "Oh, preparing for next year?" and I said "Oh, I'm a Halloween year-round kind of person" to which she said "Why not? It's fun!" Yes, yes it is.

This book is a collection of vintage Halloween traditions and history. I have already learned so much from it! I'm tempted to share all the trivia I learned, but you'd probably have more fun reading it for yourself. You get an idea from this book about the Old World celebrations around the end of October and you also get a clear idea of how Halloween would have been celebrated in early 1900s America.

The book is beautifully illustrated! The old Halloween pieces of art really add a lot.

And there are such fun details, like burnt edges and decorative corners. Even the sides of the pages are orange!

I think it's awesome that the author did so much research into early traditions and is keeping them alive through this book. I really can imagine what it was like back in the day from reading this.

I think Halloween may have been filled with more surprises and danger a century ago. I can go without the pranks, but they sure are interesting to read about!

I plan to investigate the author's reference material at some point. Perhaps some of you would like to as well?

Hopefully you can read this. As decorative as that page is, the design makes it difficult to read. 

So I had to shovel snow on Halloween night, but I got to read a Halloween book on a sunny porch on Christmas day. I'd say that evens things out in a way. :) Here's a glimpse of what Halloween looked like for me this year:

As for Christmas, I didn't have a lot of time to blog this month. So I'm just going to add a few highlights from the month to the end of this blog post.

Starting with a few of my favorite photos from this year's Miller Lights show.

We didn't have real snow that night, so some had to be created. I think this is probably some form of soap?

The beer tasting was fun as usual! Mom stuck with Miller Light and I had Miller, Blue Moon, and La Colombe. 

The tour and tasting were so packed on the night we went that we couldn't even get a table right away! I had to get resourceful in finding a place for my beer.

Yes, at Miller even the fire extinguishers make fine beer holders. :)

So here is that La Colombe I mentioned. It was listed as a "hard cold brew coffee", as you can see. I figured this was either going to be very good or very bad. It turned out to be very good! I was suspicious at first since it was listed as "black". I was thinking it would be a mix of beer and black coffee. But there was a good deal of sugar in there. Have any of you tried this drink?

I'd wanted to share some pics from Farm Girl Antiques earlier this month too! Mom and I went to their Christmas party and had a good time. They had Christmas music playing and lots of good snacks. As you're about to see, they had some great displays put together. I thought you guys might be interested in seeing how this shop looks at Christmas after seeing it at Halloween. I'd be interested to know if any of these antiques or vintage pieces look familiar to you!

Thoughts on this? :)

Kind of a neat bird's nest display:

Isn't a muffin tin or cupcake holder a cool way to display ornaments?

Isn't this a pretty display? I'm feeling motivated to put something together like that garland or swag up top.

Didn't the store look beautiful for Christmas? It's hard to believe that's even the same building we saw at Halloween! I'll leave you guys with a pic from our village. This Santa statue is new this year, and isn't he the perfect photo opp?

In case I don't update in the next couple days, Happy New Year everyone! 💖

Two houses you'll want to discover but would never want to visit!

I have two spooky pieces of entertainment to share with you guys! One is a book my friend Melody sent me and another is a movie composed of four short stories. You'll get chills while reading or watching these, but both will also linger on in your mind some time later.

Starting with the book: In the Dark of the Night by John Saul:

I could think of a handful of reasons right off the bat why Melody sent me this! The story takes place in Northern Wisconsin in an area I'm well familiar with. So it's easy for me to picture the setting. I don't think I'm giving too much away here to say that it involves some crime stories that would be very familiar to those in my state. So between the familiar setting, the true crime that is still fairly fresh, and feeling like I know some of these characters, it was easy for me to get into the book.

I think any of you would like this, though. If you're in the general Midwest area it's probably going to resonate with you more, but I'm sure it would be a scary story to anyone. I'm trying to think how I could encourage you guys to read this without giving away the many surprises and twists... OK, I can give a general idea of some themes. There's some realistic family, friend, and teen romance drama going on. There's a murder mystery or two which are centered around an old piece of property and the person who used to live there. And there's a theme that I say would fall loosely between a haunting and a possession.

You'll be left thinking about the power of previously owned objects, and the very real feeling I'm sure any of us could have around the ones in this story. I'm sure all of us have felt some kind of emotion around an object in a museum or antique store or maybe you've had a feeling in a place where an emotional event occurred. Think of that feeling but in an extreme way and you'll understand a major theme in this book. I hope that's enough to intrigue you guys because In the Dark of the Night is very worth reading! This was a book I couldn't put down and I haven't experienced that in some time. I will probably be seeking out more John Saul books in the near future.

I was hoping to find one of those book trailers for this on YouTube, but I couldn't find one. I did, however find this neat video featuring the author:

A link for those who get my blog in email form: John Saul's RV Tour

Now, on the surface this would appear to be a video about an amazing RV, but it's actually a lot more fun than that. I mean, this is the best RV I've ever seen but I wouldn't share a video solely about it. You'll get to see some of the author's personality here, which I really liked. I want to take a road trip with these guys!

Now onto The House that Dripped Blood!

What a title and what a cover. Not that the image necessarily makes sense for those who've watched this; it kind of halfway does. Now, as I read one online reviewer say, the house does not literally drip blood. So if you're looking for that kind of entertainment for whatever reason, well you won't get that here. But what you will get is a pretty darn good series of stories revolving around a spooky old mansion. Much like what I wrote about the book, the house is defined somewhere between haunted and possessed. It's a great old house. The interior reminded me of Disney's Haunted Mansion. Each story is about a tenant who briefly lived there.

The House that Dripped Blood is very much in the vein of Hammer horror movies, but better. And I'm a Hammer fan. Christopher Lee is in one of these, as is Peter Cushing. And they have that dark, 1970s, British thing going on. But the acting, the timing, the writing, everything is so much better than Hammer. I love Hammer for its cheesiness. But you're not going to see any of that orangey-red Hammer blood gushing around here or tons of cleavage. The House that Dripped Blood is actually rated PG and I think that's fair. The violence is implied, there's no sexuality, strong language, etc. I think an older kid could watch this, depending on the kid. I could have, anyway. A good comparison to this is Tales from the Crypt. You know, the way they got morality in there a bit. Yeah, it's like Tales from the Crypt writing with Hammer settings, actors, and visuals.

Again, without giving much away... The stories involve a homicidal maniac (OK actually a few of those), some Voodoo or "Witchcraft" as they call it, and vampires. The stories have a sort of brief narration/are introduced by the police who are investigating one of these cases. The stories range from scary to comical. I actually thought to look up The House that Dripped Blood at our local library because of seeing a picture from it on Tumblr. This picture:

I mean, how could I not look for it after seeing that? :)

So, if you're looking for some scary or fun (depending on your opinion) popcorn movie viewing, I recommend this one! And good news! I just found the whole thing on YouTube:

A link for those who receive my blog in email form:

The House that Dripped Blood in its entirety

Maybe some of you have seen this already. Actually, I'd be surprised if some of you haven't. I'd enjoy discussing the movie with you guys!