Sam’s been working on origami wand-toppers for months and mom and I have been faery-makin’.

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I had an intense day yesterday. Tried to go back to work and gave one massage and my head/neck started to build up to their “We’re either going to explode, or you’re going to pass out” threshold. So, I went home and bawled and worried and panicked about not being able to earn any money while the doctor bills and rent use up all my emergency funds-not to mention why the Hells I’m still sick after four months…

Anyway, my mom came over and comforted me and I calmed down and slept and-

My friends and I were being chased across a rocky desert by demons and we’d outpaced them and were catching our breath, when we glanced up and saw a condor circling, with a high-power rifle in it’s claws! Holy crapamolly! This odd sight stopped us in our tracks for a moment, until we realized that, duh, quite likely, a condor who wielded a rifle was in cahoots with the demons and even if it wasn’t, chances that it was going to be nice and normal and wait for it’s prey to die naturally were highly unlikely.

So we scrambled poste haste up the rocks and hid in a gazebo-like structure. Almost immediately, the demons caught up with us and surrounded the gazebo, grinning merrily at how neatly they’d trapped us. Amazingly, I found a submachine gun amongst the rocks(probably dropped by a clumsy luddite buzzard) and after fumbling with it for several tense moments, managed to turn the safety off and empty it into all the demons. Bullets ripped into their chests and they staggered dramatically, falling to their knees. And then, stood up, laughed at me and spat all the bullets out their mouths onto the ground. Shite, I hate demons with a sense of humor.

Inventive bastidges too, they put my companion in a glass container, filled with water and the demon chief(who had me by the arm) froze the top of the water about ten inches deep with some sort of gesture/spell. The other demons were chortling and taking bets as to whether my friend would freeze, or drown first. I was angry, but there was nothing I could do, somehow the creature that held me had rendered me powerless.

But my friend apparently was not. Not only did he NOT oblige the demons by drowning or freezing to death, he began to sculpt the ice into a stag. A freakin’ gorgeous ice sculpture stag! I was delighted, my demon captor however, was pissed and decided to take it out on me by breaking my knuckles, quite delicately(as one would crab legs to extract the tasty meat) with a tiny hammer. He asked me which hand I painted with and I said nothing(that was the hand he’d started with anyway and I figured he was only asking to torment me).

I woke as his hammer struck my hand harder and found my hands were tucked uncomfortably between my legs.

Ah, dream logic.

I also made an alternative set of horns, which Sam and I goofed off in later…

It was a really fun Halloween.. There was much partying, awesome costumage and much snuggling at Rita and Ben’s house and then I danced the night away at Pheralia with a dead guy and a pirate.

Pics here.

The art was amazing! Juliet’s pieces were glorious-large metal and rubber structures, but the rubber was this exquisitely translucent material in delicate shades of green and gold.. It looked a lot like glass, but flexible. The shapes curved sensuously and organically, like leafs and flowers, growing up from the floor or dangling mysteriously from the ceiling. One was a gorgeous gold chamber that one could climb inside and meditate in, or simply gaze in awe at the mosaic of gold fragments bound together to create the structure.

I wished I could take it home with me.

Yay art!

All the show pics here.

Otherwise, I’m pretty damned happy with the way he turned out.

Had myself a sweet little wander down at Carkeek last week.. Couldn’t resist the sand and stones and seaweed-they wanted to be a sea lion.

Mo’ pics here.

See more pics on flickr.

Aaaaaaah, it isn’t really winter ’til I’ve made a snow beast.

When Hell freezes over, the Devil Ducks call on their Ice Queen.

Yay snow! Unfortunately, it wasn’t terribly good packing snow, but I did manage to sculpt this sweet Duck Queen out on the hot tub. I was quite pleased when I was able to pluck the daisies, complete with their little fresh-fallen snow caps and poke them into her head for horns.

The alder cones and catkins made perfect eyes and eyebrows.

More pics of ducks and my late night snow walkabout here.

Mmmm…

Quite an eventful holiday.. The three goats(Merriment, Snow Princess and Chardonnay-or as the kids call them: Butt Goat, Nice Goat and Starved Goat) turned out to be quite skillful escape artists and so we spent quite a bit of time rounding them up and juryrigging the gate shut so that Merriment(Butt Goat) couldn’t eat ALL the hay.

Not to mention calming the hyper young german shepherd, Savannah(and cleaning up poop-not my favorite part). She spends much of her time locked in the laundry room, so she’s VERY ENTHUSIASTIC when let out. Luckily, our group included some avid dog fans, so she was well taken care of, even if she did still spend much of her time watching(~pantwhinepant~) the ladder for the poor cat which hardly ever comes downstairs, except to make a mad dash for the kitchen loft where her food is.

The kids had a great time feeding the chickens(Rowan practically adopted them) and ducks and we all enjoyed wrangling the goats and petting Velvet, the donkey, who seemed a bit depressed this time around.

It was lovely to get ‘lost’ in the forest, which is honeycombed with paths to yurts and cabins and farmsteads. We also took a day trip out the Double Bluff Beach and there was much sliding down bluffs,

log walking, admiring clay bastions, stacking rocks(on Delayne’s part) and I made a very odd cliff creature in the sand/clay/sandstone bluff. Most of the oddness due to the act that the head I was carving kept shifting and falling off. Oh well, it was fun.

Our feast was splendid and abundant. We had turkey, stuffing, mashed ‘taters, Rita’s amazing juiced orange sweet potatoes, cider…

(possibly a little too much cider?)

garden pumpkin and Ben’s delicious gravy(made at the risk of his life and to the detriment of his pants).

Dessert was a most delicious triple berry pie that Delayne and I found at a sweet bakery in Langley. He and I had a lovely little browse in an amazing import store there. They have gorgeous rugs, bizarrely cool hats, exquisite gemstone jewelry and these ginormous chairs carved from whole old growth tree trunks-all smooth oiled wood loveliness. I absolutely lOVE them. If I had a few extra thousand smackers, I’da brought one home for sure. As it was, I rang every bell in the place and brought three of the sweet little ones home. Amazing, hand beaten metal bells from India-they all have different tones and I chose the sweetest three of all the little ones.

Aaaaaaaaaah, such a marvelous time. More pics of farmy goodness and all our adventures here.

I’m so lucky to have such brizilliant friends and family.