What's that guy doing in here?

Howdy!

The fires have been pushed away from my home and I'm not likely to be evacuated now. :)

Still, prayers and good thoughts are needed for those who have lost their homes, as well as the victim(s) of the flames. We are yet unsure of the number of fatalities. :(


I haven't done a thing art-wise for a while now-- apart from that sign I showed you in a previous entry.

Tomorrow I'll be attending a rodeo with the boyfrannn! (If he doesn't work tomorrow... I may have just bought the tickets now, at 2AM, and haven't asked him yet...)

I love rodeos! Afterward, there will be a dance!

Slightly related story:

Last summer, my grandmother (Maw-maw) took the boyfrannn (who is a dark-skinned Dominican) and I to her hometown in Louisiana. There is a bar there which plays live Cajun music in the morning.
Many people were dancing and, once we stepped in, everyone started giving Joan interested looks. Let's just say that town is a little behind on political standings of sorts...

Joan and I tried to dance, but the Cajun two-step is NOT my thing. We were too used to pop, so we were shaking our hips and shoulders. Everyone had the right to stare at that point...

I was embarrassed, so we left the dance floor to stand with my grandmother. Joan surprised us by asking Maw-maw to dance! She actually said yes! He took her to the floor and he was much better without me trying to lead, hehe...

They danced until the end of the Cajun-French song and I caught it on video! :)

Later, I overheard my grandmother speaking on the phone to a friend. "I haven't danced in... shoot, 20 years?"

It was a beautiful thing.

Beach Sign

I'm going to be throwing the boyfrannn's niece a birthday party! A pool party to be exact. I might write a detailed post on that later.~

Since it's in August, I don't have to rush by any means, but I also live alone and I sometimes get bored out of my mind, so I decided to make these now:

I used cut planks from my mom's broken fence. I spray-painted one blue. ^^

My sister has a Cricket so I cut out the word "BEACH" and punched out the letters and used the remaining paper as a stencil. I used white acrylic paint and a cheap foam brush, and voila!

Halloween Music Ideas

*Again, I'm moving this post form my Tumblr to my Blogspot. Sorry about the off-season holiday posting. :)

Here’s some tips for your already-awesome Halloween party!

We’ll start with music! My following posts will include decorations, games, prizes, and crafts! :)

Many of us, including myself, have searched Google for Halloween songs to add to our playlists. But it seems like everyone suggests the same 10 songs, right? “Thriller”, “This is Halloween”, “The Monster Mash.”

Well, this year I suggest a more modern alternative. Who says the songs have to be about Halloween to be spooky?

Create a creepy atmosphere with popular hits and some indie songs to get the party going.

Here’s ten of my song suggestions.

♫♪♫♪♫♪♫♪ 

First up, we have “Disturbia.” If you’re like me and can’t stand Rihanna,  try the rock version by The Cab! The intro is more eerie and the boys do a great job with it!

Next is “Crawling in the Dark” by Hoobastank.

Less of a dance tune, “Autumn Story” by Firekites is a great spooky song for Halloween and all of fall.

“Livin’ La Vida Loca” by Ricky Martin. This song is popular, fun, and involves a creepy tone when he sings about the strange girl.

If you and your guests have played the recently popular game “Plants vs. Zombies”,“Zombies on Your Lawn” is perfect if you want a little relief from creepy music.

Try “Magic” by B.o.b. and Rivers Cumos for a good dance tune! It’s fun and pulls in the theme of magic, which will be fun for the witches at the party.

If you grew up on Scooby Doo in the 90s, you probably remember the movie where the gang visited the swamps of Louisiana and encounter cat-people and zombies. A scene in the movie has the song “It’s Terror Time Again” by Skycycle, which is a really enjoyable song, especially if has the feeling of nostalgia. J

The not-very-well-known 90s band Allstars made a song called “Bump in the Night”, which is a poppy way to celebrate this cool holiday!

I love the movie “The Labyrinth!” In it, David Bowie, dawned in awkward tights, sings a song called “Dance Magic,” which is a great dance tune and has me repeating the opening with my sister all the time.

And, finally, Regina Spektor’s voice incredible and powerful, especially in her song“Apre Moi.” It’s a great song which connotates a spooky air and dark-sounding instruments.

If you want more music ideas, check out the link below for my Halloween playlist. It has instrumental music if your party isn’t really for dancing and even some classic Halloween hits.

http://www.playlist.com/playlist/17946694923

Halloween Decoration Ideas

I know Halloween is months away, but I need to move these from my Tumblr page onto my Blogspot. X)

As for decorations, I honestly found some awesome stuff at Dollar Tree.

Being my favorite store, it has awesome deals and has products for every season when they come ‘round, which is great for someone who likes to throw seasonal parties.

Here are some of the items I purchased there:

I found this creepy cloth which comes in black and gray. I’ll drape the grey over the tables to add an eerie atmosphere and use the black as a cheap (but large) spider web. They also sell awesome velvet spiders.

Source: http://mathewsfamilyhappenings.blogspot.com/, where you can learn to make an awesome Halloween wreath upon scrolling down! :)

Dollar Tree also has paper lanterns, which are very cute, but the lights inside don’t always work. It’s rare that they do, plus they require batteries. If you’d like to get the lanterns because of their looks, use these cheap, light-up candles from the same store and place them inside, or just leave them without a light. Either way, they’re super cute.

There’s also an assortment of wall hangings, stickers, gel window stickies, and more.

  (Target $ section)

 

(^ Transparent stickers from Dollar Tree)

I’ve also purchased miniature Styrofoam tombstones from there.

Wal*Mart has miniature hay-bales for $8, which will continue to be useful to place outside amongst Jack-o-Lanterns or blank pumpkins later in the fall.

Wal*Mart also has LED “strobe” lights and “blacklights”, but these don’t work well at all. One of the three black lights I purchased was broken and when I tried out another one, I realized these aren’t really blacklights, but, well, black lightbulbs that don’t really give off any light. The LED light was more for a pumpkin and didn’t strobe at all, but rather slowly changed from blue to green to red and wasn’t bright enough for a room.

From Walgreens, I bought this pack of 25 scented tea candles for $3.99, which I’ll be using to light the party instead of having the room’s lights on.

 They were red, however. They also has orange ones for the fall season. :)

In addition to my store-bought décor, I’ve also created some crafts to put around my home.

Have a happy Halloween in... 4 months...

Halloween Spiderweb Entry

This craft came from several items I picked up from Dollar Tree. I did this in my last apartment for Halloween 2011.

SIMPLE FABRIC SPIDER WEB

Supplies:

• Push pins
•  "Creepy Cloth" (x2 or more, as desired) from Dollar Tree, $1
• "Black Spider" (these come in two sizes. The smaller ones are 2 for $1, the larger is $1.) I love these because of the cool designs on their backs.

For this craft, you could position the web to a place where guests must walk through it, as I have here:

Otherwise, pinning it directly to a wall is just as simple. :)

1. Open and stretch out the "creepy cloth" as desired, leaving either tanlges or letting all the ends out as seen at the bottom of my web.
2. Using the cloth and your pushpins, tack the fabric to the wall.
3. Add the spider. The 'web' is made up of many small holes through which the spiders' legs can be pushed. Tangle their feet in the web and viola!!

Family-Friendly Halloween Specials

For a HUGE list of pretty-much every Halloween special episode/short, click HERE.

But here is a list of my favorite Halloween specials. :) All are family-friendly!

1. Shrek Halloween Special: Thriller Night

(If the video does not work for you, the link is HERE:

http://youtu.be/g7vCuB-_omY

This version has Spanish subtitles.

ESTA VERSION ESTA SUBTITULADA EN ESPAÑOL.)

Shrek goes to a movie theatre and sees "The Sound of Music" and complains that he wants to see something scary. Donkey has a "spontaneous, musical outburst" and sings "Thriller" throughout the video with other characters who also dance~

2. Dreamworks Spooky Stories
Dreamworks whipped up a DVD of 3 Halloween shorts in 2009!
It includes:

• "Scared Shrekless"
• In this short, several characters tell spooky stories
• "The Ghost of Lord Farquad"
• Lord Farquad returns and Dragon is still somehow evil. The film was made to be a 4-D attraction at Universal Studios (which I'm proud to say I was able to see when I was younger)

• A "Monsters vs. Aliens" short called "Mutant Pumpkins"
• Mutant Jack-o-Lanterns take over Susan's hometown

They are now available on Netflix! :)

3. Mickey Mouse's House of Mouse: Donald's Halloween Scare

http://youtu.be/c7BiNY86xjA

In 2000, Mickey Mouse's House of Mouse was the cool thing to be watching among my friends and siblings!

This entire episode is Halloween-themed, but this is just a clip. It features Donald's nephews (Huey, Louie, and Dewey) going trick-or-treating. Their uncle scares them so bad, they drop their candy and must somehow get revenge.

4. "Garfield's Halloween Adventure"
Binky the Clown, the creepy star of a children's television show, reminds Garfield that it's Halloween. The famous fat cat convinces Odie to go with him and the two find a haunted mansion.~

This is a 24-minute-long episode of Garfield. This is family-friendly, however, kids may not have the attention span for this one... Even for a previous Garfield-obsessee, it's a bit dry at times. :)

5. "Scooby-Doo and the Ghoul School"
This absorbed a large portion of my daily routine at one point of my childhood.
The voice cast is superb and even includes a newsie! (Mush, to be exact.~)

Scooby, Shaggy, and Scrappy become substitute teachers at an all-girls (all-monster) school. They compete in a series of games against an all-boys military school next door.~

This is a movie and can be found in-whole on Youtube here:

http://youtu.be/4XexWb21-RI

More to come in the future! Until then, keep in mind that there's only 137 days to Halloween! ;)

-Gabi

Easy Hair-Appliance Organization

Today I saw THIS on Pinterest.

I had only one folder-organizer and I was going to hang it on a hook on the side of my cabinet, but my hairdryer was too big so it was bending the organzier. :\

I looked around my home for something else to hang and I found this wired trashcan from Dollar Tree (I swear I should be sponsors by Dollar Tree!). I hung it up and stuffed my hair supplies right in the basket-- where I can easily access them. :)

Hooray.

Happy birthday to me!

It seems every single one of my friends forgot.

At least my family remembered.~

And I'm sure the boyfrannn remembered, but unfortunately he is unable to call me. :<

I wanted to share this picture of the boyfrannn with y'all.~

Got him that shirt for his high school graduation-- when we first started going out.~

But it's NOT okay to stare-- he's mine! ;D

GAH, I miss him! But luckily, he's coming home in two days!! :)

The Displeased: A Poke'mon Creepypasta

Hi, party people!

As a child, Poke'mon was a huge part of my life!

A few months back, it became so again. I created an OC (original character) for Poke'mon, starting re-playing the Gameboy games, re-organized my card collection, and wrote some Poke'mon creepypastas.

If you don't know, a creepypasta is a short, horror/thriller story.

Poke'mon creepypastas are a breed of these stories about the fictional world of Poke'mon (which is highly developed).

I thought I'd share one of my Poke'mon creepypastas with you today! :) If you don't know about Poke'mon, you probably won't understand this in the least... I stopped watching Poke'mon after Johto, the second era of the Poke'mon series, so if you only have knowledge about Johto or even Kanto, you should be fine. :)

http://smokeylove11.deviantart.com/art/Poke-mon-The-Displeased-252576278

Enjoy~! <3

A piece of Poke'mon fanart I made for a contest (Nyan Cat + Charizard)