October's Reading

   Hi everyone. Another month has arrived which means it's time to share my reading from October. Even though I have a long list of things I want to read, I got a little distracted this past month by some recommended books which were not on my list. But it was all good! I also found a newly published book also not on my list that I couldn't stop thinking about so I had to read it. And of course, since Halloween was in October, I read a couple of books inspired by that holiday. 

   It was a good reading month, and I liked being led in some other reading directions from my usual picks, even if in reality I really wasn't led too far off of my usual choices. 😏

     I  love Elly Griffiths' writing style and her mysteries. This first listen for October was Bleeding Hearts Yard, book 3 of the 4 Harbinger Kaur mysteries. Several years ago I read book 1 in this series, The Stranger Diaries, and then I kind of forget about this series until  Jeanie mentioned this story in a book post last month. Harbinger Kaur played a small role in book 1, but in this book she plays a much more major role. Kaur is a Sikh woman detective in London who is  in charge of this most recent case. Good thing too since I  like her as a detective and character.

  In this story there's a 21st year class reunion at a school. The class celebrating contains  many people who went on to become famous (actors, rock stars, in government),  and during this reunion someone dies. Well they don't just die, but are murdered. One of the people at the reunion is one of Kaur's detectives named Cassie. 

   Gary, the person who died at the reunion,  happened to see the death of one of his classmates right after graduation years earlier. The classmate who died all those years ago had, according to one of the girls in the group, raped her, and the group decided to scare him by pretending to push him in front of the train. Although you don't find out the whole story very early on in the book, you learn that he did fall in front of the train and was hit. Gary's death at the 21st reunion must have some connection to that earlier death, and also to a place called Bleeding Heart Yard. Detective Kaur (at first) doesn't know what this place is.

   Then there are more deaths among this group of friends as well as even a bit for romance. I didn't see the ending coming in this one either. Plus, I liked how the the author wrapped up the story by telling what happens right after the murder is solved.  I enjoyed this novel so much that I used an Audible credit to get the next one in the series, which you can read about as you move down through this post. And I noticed there is a little Easter-egg right at the end of this book about the main characters in the next novel too.

   And just a note, I have not read book 2 in this series at this point, but I could follow along with no problems. I think each of these books is in many ways a stand alone story with the only connection being Harbinger Kaur making an appearance.

   I have a friend who is a retired archaeologist, and she highly recommended this book to me. The main character of this story is Ember Agni who is an unhappy professor of archaeology at a university. At the opening of the story, Ember gets a letter that says an artifact is being brought to her by the man who replaced her on a dig in an out of the way place. Early on, you don't know much about this dig or why Amber didn't go herself. But you quickly learn tidbits that pull together this part of the story.

   I must admit, if my friend hadn't said that the beginning of the book was just so-so, I probably would have closed it early on and moved onto something else. The first 75 or so pages seemed to be lots of repeated scenes, and the story at this point seemed like it would just drone on. Ember's marriage is in trouble, and she doesn't seem to care that it is. (I felt bad for her husband.) At the University where she works, she is only going through the motions.  She keeps talking about this mysterious artifact, building up some suspense, but also it got a bit repetitive. 

   Then I noticed a change in the story. You learn more about the man sent on the dig rather than Ember, and then  Ember gets the artifact. She also gets a chance of her lifetime to go south to look for artifacts herself.  

  In the beginning of the book  I thought the setting was  in our modern world, and it could easily be.  But once this book starts to make those subtle changes, I quickly realized (and was surprised) that this book is  set in the future, after much of humanity was wiped out from melting glaciers and rising sea levels. The environmental catastrophe that happened not only wiped out much of humanity, but it also wiped up what much of what there is in our civilization. People have moved north, where it is now much warmer, and the artifact that Ember gets is actually from our time. 

   This book ended up being quite an interesting read. It's the kind of book that you want to talk  about with someone. (My friend and I did  have a  nice chat about it.)  I can't say it was the best story I've ever read, but I was quite curious where it was going to go. It definitely had some surprises, and even though I predicted the gist of the end, I didn't see it happening as it did. I also never really liked the main character Ember.  But saying that, this book was different  from my normal choices which made it enjoyable to read. It was also one of those stories that I don't think I will quickly forget, mainly because of its uniqueness and how sometimes the least likable characters are ones you remember the longest. 

    Bleeding Heart Yard, my first listen for the month, ends with the introduction of Detective Harbinger Kaur's good friends. That trio is a quirky group of amateur detectives. There is Natalka, a Ukrainian refugee who works in a care home and has also opened her own detective agency. Then there is Benedict who is Natalka's live-in partner. He runs a coffee shop and is a former monk. The other friend is 84 year old Edwin who is a former BBC producer, Wordle lover and has become Natalka's detective partner.  These characters are the centerpiece of this next book  in the series, The Last Word,  #4 out of 4 of the Harbinger Kaur books.  This was my next listen. I really liked the narrator, Nina Wadia,  when I listened to book 3, so I was happy she also narrated this book. 

   After many cases of  spouses cheating on their partners, the agency finally gets a murder case. This time 2 daughters are claiming their mother's new husband has murdered her. The husband is of course claiming he did not kill her. The mother is a romance writer. Benedict also discovers that another monk he knew, who also wrote romance novels, has died. And strangely enough, all of them have obituaries written by a man who died over a year ago himself. 

  To  do some investigations, Benedict and Edwin head to a writers workshop where both of the victims had been not long before their deaths. And while they are there, there is another murder. All these deaths seem to interconnect. Harbinger Kaur gets involved too, but really only on the fringes of this story. However, I did like her 3 friends who are main characters. 

   This was a fun listen.  I enjoyed these characters and how they solved the murder. However, I liked how Bleeding Heart Yard was more of a police based novel.  This story was certainly enjoyable, and it did seem a bit more like a cozy style mystery, perhaps because of the amateur detectives. Still, I am glad I listened to it because it’s a good tale, and there is nothing wrong with a very good cozy style mystery. I'm also glad Griffiths interjected Harbinger Kaur here and there.

 

   I love when I can read about a real historical mystery and the science that  is then used to  solve it. This next read for me, History By A Hair but Richard Kurin is a new release (September 2026).  It is all about when a hair was found in one of Thomas Jefferson's bibles. (For those unfamiliar, Thomas Jefferson was the third American president and the writer of the Declaration of Independence.) 

   This hair was red (as Jefferson's hair color was described), and it was determined that it was human hair, not animal hair. Was it Jefferson's actual hair? The next question was, could they use this hair to get DNA? And another question was, if they could get DNA and if it was Jefferson's, could they use it to answer a historical question that has been debated since when Jefferson ran for a second term as president in 1800? That question was, did the third president of the US have children with one of his slaves, Sally Hemings?

  Of course in order to answer these main questions, there were a lot of other questions, all described very clearly in this book.

 I knew that several years ago some male descendants of Sally Hemings and also some male descendants of Thomas Jefferson's uncle had their DNA tested. They were checking the Y chromosome which is only passed on through males and does not contain many genes (basically just those to make a baby male). A father  passes on his exact Y chromosome to his son. Occasionally there  is a  mutation in that DNA which is why over all the years modern people have been around not every male has the same Y chromosomal DNA. The hope was that this earliest DNA testing would confirm (or not) whether Sally's descendants were related to the Jefferson descendants.

   That answer to this original testing came back yes, there were Y chromosomes matches. But because all of Jefferson's patronymic male relatives would have this same Y chromosome DNA, it didn't directly answer the question because it didn't limit Thomas Jefferson as the father.  Any of the Jefferson men could have been the father. That's where this latest testing comes in. 

  A more complete test would be to look at the DNA found in a  cell's nucleus because that DNA contains all the organism's/human's  genetic information, including the Y chromosome found in males. If they could extract DNA from this hair found in Jefferson's Bible, they could then get a better and more complete picture.  Maybe they could even answer the question about Jefferson and Sally Hemings.

   This book is all about getting that nuclear DNA. And it includes more too. The author (Richard Kurin) takes you through family history, the history of Jefferson's home Monticello, and family grave yard  as well Jefferson's history too. And if  you are  not familiar with how DNA works, there's even the science behind that. And more.  I LOVED this book and found it very hard to put down. Kurin wrote a clear and concise story. The only recommendation I can make is I wish there was more of a way the author could had made all the families being tested (at least early in the book because it was easier to follow as the book progressed) a bit clearer. There were family trees at the end, but perhaps something as the book went along, mainly because there were so many names, and especially at first, it was a bit  confusing. But I didn't overly focus on those names, and just let the story take me forward, so it wasn't really a huge issue.

    It's unusual for me to continue with a series right after I finish listening to 2 other books in the same series.  I had wanted to listen to Barnaby Rudge by Charles Dickens. It's a 32 hour listen and after 4 hours into  it I was still having trouble keeping some of the characters straight. That's when I decided I might be better off actually reading the Dickens book. This Dickens novel is a new one for me, and although I loved listening to some of his other novels, at least I had read those stories before listening to them.

   After the decision to move on from Barnaby Rudge,  I wasn't feeling very adventurous, so I decided to listen to book 2 in the Harbinger Kaur mysteries by Elly Griffiths. I knew I liked the narrator since she read the last 2 books (in this series) that I listened to. And as I mentioned above, I had read book one in this series a long time ago (long enough I may need to go back to that one too), but not this book. This ended up being a good choice because I got to spend some time with some now familiar to me characters. Not only does this book involve Harbinger Kaur, but Natalka, Edwin and  Benedict from book 4 are in this story too. 

   This time Edwin's neighbor, 90 something year old Peggy Smith, passes. She was also one of Natalka's clients for Natalka has yet to start her detective agency and is "just" a caregiver at this point. When Natalka was cleaning out Peggy's books, she realized that all these mysteries were either dedicated to Peggy or else Peggy was thanked in the book's afterwards.  Often those thanks  referred to Peggy as the Murder Consultant.

  Then there's a couple more author related deaths, some men in a white Ford Fiesta, a trip to Aberdeen, Scotland, and Harbinger's Mom getting injured.  Plus, since I knew Benedict and Natalka were together as a couple in book 4, that whole romantic situation is set up.

   I enjoyed this story quite a bit, and how it related to mystery writers. All along I wanted to know what was the clue in the book that the amateur sleuths saw stolen while they were held at gunpoint. Griffiths did a good job of surprising me as a reader about that. I also enjoyed how Harbinger Kaur played a good sized role in this story. Now that I have finished this series, I'm curious if there will be any new ones. Wait and see I guess. I can always go back and reread book 1 which I still own. It's been several years since I've read it, so  I'm adding it to my list. 😉

   And thank you Jeanie for sending me on this Harbinger Kaur reading route too! 

   After I finished reading about Thomas Jefferson and his DNA, I was trying to decide what to read next. I finished the Jefferson book before dinner, and then a bit later, right before bed. I was looking for something else to read.  I didn't want anything too heavy, plus I still hadn't fully processed the Jefferson book in my head. But I wasn't sleepy, and I find I sleep better if I read a bit. Anyhow, after trying a few different books that didn't work for me, I settled on this light but always fun series to read, a Chet and Bernie mystery by Spencer Quinn. I hadn't read any books from  this series for quite a while. 

   The Dog Who Knew Too Much is book 4 in this series, and I've jumped around as I've read them. (The story does progress, but not enough to make reading them out of order tough to do.) Chet is a police canine flunky who is black with one white ear. Bernie is his owner, and he is a private investigator. This time a woman comes to Bernie and asks him to "pretend" to be her boyfriend for 2 days. He says no, but he could use the money she is offering so his no ends up being a yes.

  Bernie, Chet and the woman go off to the camp where her son is spending the summer. It's parent's weekend. The woman's ex-husband is supposed to be there, but he is not. Neither is the son, who has gone missing on a wilderness hike and camping trip. Then there's a couple of murders, Chet being dog napped, Bernie being arrested by a crooked sheriff, a meth lab and the FBI showing up. Thank goodness Suzie, Bernie's girlfriend, is able to step in.

   What I love about these books is that the story is told through Chet's eyes. And the author is definitely a dog guy because Chet reminds me of some dogs I've known, especially Mr. Pete. Chet is loyal, loves riding shotgun in Bernie's beat up Porsche with his head out the window, gets excited when Bernie wants to cook a steak for dinner...well you get the drift. Plus I laugh a lot in these stories. There was a bacon package in a window scene in this book that was hard to stop laughing about while I read it,and I'm still laughing even now as I think about it. 😁

   Like the other books in this series I have read or listened to, this book moved quickly, is a perfect before bed read and is an enjoyable tale. And it doesn't take very long to get through the whole book either.

 

   Last month when I read a book in an Icelandic mystery series I realized how much I missed reading mysteries set on this island. This month I decided to try a new series, and so I read book #1, The Clue in the Fjord, by Satu Ramo.  The author is a native of Finland and is married to an Icelandic man. She lives with her family in Iceland. 

   The 2 main characters in this series are Hildur, who is the only child-services detective in the Northwest of Iceland. She lives and works in Isafjordur, a small community in the northern part of West Fjords.  The other main character is Jakob, who is in the police university/academy in Finland. He comes to Iceland on a student program, mainly to escape the breakdown of his marriage. I love that he chose Iceland because he's become addicted to knitting, especially Icelandic sweaters, and thought being in Iceland would be a great way to enhance his knitting.  Of course, there are several secondary characters too.

   This book took a bit to get rolling as the characters were introduced and the scene of the main story was set up. Saying that, the beginning did move along; it just took a while before the first murder  happened. But when it did happen, it was rather dramatic since there's an avalanche. The summer house that was supposed to be empty had a man in it, but when they dug him out, they found that he didn't die in the avalanche but instead had his throat cut  before the snow covered him.

   The avalanche murder was not the only one.  This book took some interesting twists and turns before it concluded. I really like how the author included "things" about living in Iceland to enhance the story. For example,  the country has a website where an Icelandic person can log on and follow their family trees back to the time of the Vikings. These "things" (like the family tree website) played a role in the story which made the book feel very authentic. I very much enjoyed reading it, and now book 2 is on my radar.

  And thank you to my friend Elle for this recommendation. I know you aren't blogging any longer but maybe you will see this thanks.

    It was then getting close to Halloween, and I wanted to read something for the season. A friend had read this book and recommended it. I knew it would be a fast read because McFadden's writing is not frilly. She gets right to the point, and none of her books are overly long either. (Or at least none of her Housemaid series of books, the only other ones, besides this one, that I have read.)

  This book captured my interest right away. Julia, a young woman in her 20's, has lost her job and now out of money, has traveled back to Massachusetts to move in with her elderly and confused grandmother. There's also a great aunt and an elderly caretaker living in the house too. And is there a ghost? Grandmother lives in a large ancient house called Pemberton where the grandfather clock stops working at 3:41 every day, you have to lock your bedroom doors at night to stay safe, and something is going on in the attic. It may all sound cliche, but it creates a great atmosphere. Plus Julia is a great character who decides she is going to get to the bottom of what all this "ghostly" activity actually is, including bringing in a ghost detective.

  Parallel to this story is the story of Caroline, who lives in Pemberton  with her husband in 1692. She is accused of being a witch simply for having lots of common sense. Caroline is married to Julia's great,great, great (not sure how many great that would be) grandfather, and although she never has children with this husband, that is the connection to Julia in the present time. Also in the house is Molly, a maid, who ends up being Julia's great, great, great (just like the grandfather, not sure how many great that would be) grandmother once Caroline is burned at the stake.

   But beware. How McFadden can come up with such twisty  conclusions amazes me. This time there were several particularly good twists. I never saw any of it coming. I very much enjoyed this story. It was a  different type of thriller and was well done. It made a good Halloween read, even though it's not spooky and not even really related to Halloween. I do recommend this book.

  My last listen for October was The Witching Hours by Heather Graham. This book had every potential to be a good cozy Halloween inspired mystery read. There's Skye McMahon, who works  a special unit of the FBI and who sees things that happen. Her partner is Zach Erickson who also has some physical abilities. They are called in for a murder at an old home in Salem, Massachusetts.  An elderly man is killed in bed, and Skye sees the murder happening in one of her visions. The killer is someone with green skin in a classic witch's costume. But besides the murder, the family's au pair and the murdered man's young grandson have gone missing.

   Then another person and her young son go missing. This time it's the wife and child of a man who runs a Halloween shop in a nearby town called Swampscott.  

  I could forgive the reader for pronouncing Peabody as it is spelled and not as it is said. (The book said Pea-body instead of Pea-buddy). But I had a hard time with the idea that there are deep dark unexplored woods outside of Salem, Massachusetts. There are woods, but you'd have to go to parts of New Hampshire or definitely Maine for deep, dark and unexplored. And while Skye and Zach are looking for the missing people, they are in those deep dark woods. They pass a moose and a wolf. It's been probably more than 150 years (at least) since any wild wolves were wild in Massachusetts. (Hmmm. Maybe she meant to write that they saw Eastern Coyote????) And although there may be a moose in the woods, it would be rare on the North Shore outside of Salem.  This is an issue I have when people write stories about places they look up online and haven't got an actual feel for.  I know this is fiction so it's OK to bend the truth for the sake of the story, right??? Well, maybe in some circumstances, but these details really bugged me.

   I almost stopped reading  here, but then I decided to continue because 1) this book took no focus on my part to follow so I could listen while I spent time cleaning the garden or at my art table. Plus 2) it didn't cost me any money  or even credits on Audible to get.  3) It wasn't a super long book, and since I was into the murder mystery, I wanted to see how that was solved. However, I did think once or twice that I was probably wasting my time since I could have been listening to something where things like deep dark woods and wild wolves in Massachusetts weren't put in for just for the story's atmosphere. (And these details really didn't add to the story, in my opinion at least.)

   Other than what I've already mentioned about the woods, this book was not terrible. It was definitely light, and even though it had this  devil murder  story going on, I actually quite enjoyed that part. Parts were a bit  predictable, and sometimes it felt like the author was trying too hard to create something in Salem for Halloween.  It did have good reviews though, and in the end I decided it wasn't really a waste of my time. It wasn't the best book I'd ever read (especially  the part I already mentioned about the woods), but it was entertaining enough. 

  Speaking of recommended books, I'm currently reading another one and listening to one too, but since neither of those are finished, you will have to wait until my next reading post for them. 😉

   Have a great reading November!

  

   

  

T Stands for Falling Leaves and Celebrations

     Hi everyone. And hello to those of you who stop by for T Day over at  Bleubeard's and Elizabeth's         blog.   FYI- this is a bit of a long post today. So grab a drink you can use another time for T day and get comfy. 😏

    So what's new with me? Last week I finished PT. My shoulder is not 100% better, but I reached the end of the exercise program they were teaching me. Plus there is only 1 motion that still gives me a little bit of pain.  I am continuing with the exercises at home though,  so hopefully I won't need to go back to PT and my shoulder will feel 100% soon. 👍

   Last week started off with some relaxing days, and then things became a bit busy. The big thing was the wind that we had at the end of the week. So  many of the leaves came down. This week I need to work on doing some cleaning up because in spots the unraked leaves are up over my ankles.

   And there are still more leaves to come down. This is what happens when you live in an oak forest. 🤷

   We've also had a couple of nights with frost, so most of the garden plants  are now either going dormant or have died.

     Maybe now that the grapevine has died back I can straighten out my arbor that (I think) a raccoon climbed up on and made it lean.

     It seems only the geraniums are really tough.

    And so are my roses too.

    On Halloween afternoon I went to a fun movie event with a friend.

   Hocus Pocus is a 1993 Disney film about the 3 Sanderson  witch sisters who were hung in Salem (MA) back in (I guess) 1692 and come back to life when a virgin lights the black flame candle in their home.  It's Disney, so for those of you who haven't seen the film, it is not scary nor spooky. And of course it is all fiction. I didn't realize it started off as a flop in movie theaters but when it came to TV it took on "cult" status. Anyhow, I really like the film as does my friend Deb so we decided to go see it on the big screen.

   At this showing you received a candy box which was similar to an advent calendar. In certain parts of the film there was a note on the screen that told you to open one of the doors. In it you would find some candy. For example, one of the witch sisters often said "I smell children". When they said that, you opened the door and took out a sour-patch-kid candy to eat.

   It was way too much sugar, but still I'm glad I did it. (Once was enough though. I don't need to go again.) Plus the theater was sold out, except for the 2 sections where the screen is not visible  and where you couldn't buy a ticket. My friend and I did not dress up, but so many people did. It was almost more fun than the candy box to see everyone in costumes. 😉

   And even though I thought the theater would be filled with children, there were not that many. In fact, pre-movie the lines to the theater's bar were extremely long. We didn't get anything to drink in the theater though. Before the film we went to a local shop for a hot cocoa. (Sorry, no photo but I'll still count it as one of my T day drinks 😉.) Low and behold one of our former students was working there for his last day. He saw us before we saw him, and he came over and scooped us both up in hugs. He was a kid who didn't have the most supportive home life so he had to work his way through college, which he did. This week he starts a new job working for an investment company. It makes me happy to see former students get their lives together, especially those students I worked quite closely with.  It's one of those belated thanks you get in a job that is often thankless. 

   I have several drinks for T this week since also at the end of last week both my husband and my daughter had birthdays. (Not on the same day, but 1 day apart.) We didn't do much on my husband's birthday because we had our "party" when we visited my daughter for her birthday. However, I did take him out for breakfast because it was still his birthday, and I wanted to do something nice for him.

   Here's our diet Pepsi we had with our late morning breakfast.

    When we went out to my daughter's on her birthday we all went out for a late lunch. My daughter's choice was Elm City Brewery and Pub. The restaurant is in this old refurbished factory. I've eaten there before, and they have good food.

   And good beer too. 😉 I had water with my lunch as well as one of the best porters I have ever had.

   After lunch we went back to my daughter's house and had cake. We had one cake for both my husband and my daughter.  I can't believe my daughter turned 35. A few of you might know that she is going to have a baby in February. We are all very excited about that.

   You can see my husband's Coke Zero in the  cake photo too. 

   The cake was huge since we stopped at Sam's Club on our way. (There's no Costco in that direction.) After we had our birthday slices we split the leftovers in half, so I still have cake in the house. I'm trying very hard to stay away from it, especially after all the movie candy. Grin.

   OK, I have finally made it to the end of last week. Wishing everyone a happy T day and week ahead.

Second on the Second

   Hi everyone. It's a new week, and it's November 2. My big project this week is to  put the winter wrappings on my beehives. I've had them wrapped in a tarp as a wind break, but nights are getting quite chilly. Plus, as I was looking back for something to share for Second on the Second (over at Bleuebeard's and Elizabeth's blog), I realized that we've had a lot of November snow events.  I am not quite ready for that! Luckily the next few days are going to be quite mild for New Hampshire ❤.

  I ended up not going with a snowy view for my Second look this month. Here's my post from November 9, 2023 which has more of a late autumn theme. 

   Here's the journal page I shared in that post that is all about the colors of November.

   I also thought I'd share a new journal page  for Wendy's Colors of Autumn challenge over at Art Journal Journey,

   You might remember the tag from back in September. I recycled it onto this journal page. I added the orange polka dot paper because orange is definitely a color of autumn even if by November a lot of the orange has sadly gone. Then I cut out a face from a magazine image and added orange hair to her. I also added an orange flower with a center I  enhanced a bit as well as some leaves. I added the orange confetti dots to the leaves because they made me think of berries. 

   Other than the yellow-orange border I drew in, this page didn't need anything else, at least as far as I could see. 😉

   I hope you're having a great start to not only the new week, but the new month also.

  

Maud Lewis: Part 3-The FInal Views

 Hi everyone. I hope you are having a lovely weekend. Mine has been busy, and once the wind dies down, I need to go clean up some leaves. In the last couple of days it's like the whole forest of leaves fell into my yard. 😉

 Yes this post is #2 for today, but because I will not be around next weekend for SITAR and Sunday Smiles, I wanted to finish off the Maud Lewis photos today. 

 You might remember that back in late September I visited  the Nova Scotia Art Museum in Halifax. These photos are some of the other pieces of Maud Lewis' work.  I'll be linking this post up to Gillena's Hey It's Sunday and also Nicole's Sunday in the Art Room.

   Also please excuse my photos that might be slightly less than perfect do to the fact that it's hard to take photos in a museum due to lighting and other people being around when you try to get a photo. I did try to straighten a few of these also, but somehow it didn't help. 😞 They are what they are, and you can get the gist of them.

   Let me start with 3 cat paintings which might just be Lewis' most famous subjects, especially this first one.

   She also painted some lovely winter scenes.

Because Maud and Everett did not have a lot of money, Maud painted on whatever she could find. Notice this next winter scene is done on a serving tray.

   Here's a couple of other paintings on trays. I wonder if this train one was painted for the tourist market specifically because I noticed what looks like US flags on the front of the engine.   This is how Maud began her professional career, by selling paintings outside of her home to people driving by. Usually her paintings sold for $2-$3, but once she was "discovered", she raised the price as high as $8.00. (Now you might end up paying  as high as $20,000 for one of her pieces.)

   The painting above this last tray is an early painting of Maud's. The write up next to it said she often painted images from books when she first started. The scene  definitely looks different from her later works.

    And here's a multi seasoned themed piece.

I took a close up of this one because I wanted to see the bees much more clearly.

   Being from Coastal Nova Scotia, Maud also painted some beautiful ocean scenes.

    And finally for  the last of my photos, here's the original door from her house which you can see she painted many times.

   I photographed most of the exhibit, but I know I didn't get all of her paintings. I hope you enjoyed them. I really enjoyed her primitive style and all the lovely colors she used.  If you missed my first 2 posts about Maud Lewis and if you'd like to see them, you can find them here: Maud Lewis Part 1 an also here: Maud Lewis Part 2.

  I have some other photos of some other artists exhibited in the museum, which I will share at a later time.  

  And as I mentioned above,  I'll be around all this  week, but I am leaving this upcoming Saturday on a girl's trip for a few days. I will not be joining  Sitar or Hey It's Sunday next weekend. 

  Have a super rest of your weekend and week ahead. 

   

Welcome November

     Hi everyone. Happy new month to you.  It's already November. Actually I like November because it's one of those months that is quiet. After all the running around of summer and the fun of fall, November  means the yard work is just about done; there's usually a bit of chill in the air so I can pull out my sweaters, and with the days being so short there's lots of cozy reading time. I'm also hoping that this year the elections results will go well and then all the flyers, texts and TV ads will disappear. And hopefully there'll be no shenanigans from anyone in DC or elsewhere. 🤞

    OK enough about that.  It’s time for a new host to take over this month at  Art Journal Journey   First let me thank Mia who besides being a super host also had a great challenge.   I also wanted to thank everyone who joined in and shared some wonderful art. ❤

    This month we  have a new host.  We admins want to welcome  back  the talented Wendy. You might know her from her blog  Wendy's Art and Crafts Journal. Her challenge this month is 

THE COLORS OF AUTUMN

  I'm excited to be able to continue with some of this season's inspired art.  For my first page, I'm going with the longer nights that come with this month. We are just changing the clocks on this November 1, so darkness will be coming quite early tonight. 🌜

    I started my page with this barn owl image I had in my stash. The background paper is one I pulled out of an old Somerset Studio magazine. I thought the owl worked great on it. That meant all I had to do was pull the page together.

   I did that by using a punch out late autumn brown leaf images as well as the copper swirl sticker at the bottom of the owl image. I die cut the stars using some copper sparkle paper. Finally I used a stamped quote to finish off my page. 

  I also need to remind you that Art Journal Journey is an art journaling challenge, so please NO cards, tags, ATCs, etc. Unless of course they are on a journal page. 😏 We accept any type of art journaling. And also be aware that not everyone is on every type of social media so if you link up through a source other than blogging, we may not be able to comment on your piece.

  I hope you are still inspired by the colors of autumn and will join us this month at AJJ.

  

Halloween Faces for Friday

   Hi everyone. Happy Friday.  

  Last Friday I shared  my neighbors down the road skeleton displays. They change these every week in October. Here's this week's display. It's not a very good photo since I snapped it from the window of my husband's car when we were heading out yesterday. I love how the skelly on the left has a unicorn to ride. Smile. 

   Today I am joining Nicole for her Friday Face Off  and Gillena for her Friday Lunch Break. Since tomorrow is Halloween, and since one thing I have been working on is a Halloween journal, I thought I'd share a few pages that I created. 

   You'll notice there are lots of faces too. 👍

   I like to try new ideas for Halloween because otherwise it seems like I make the same thing year after year. I don't know how far a stretch these pages are, but I feel they are at least different from things I've made in the past.

   I really like this first page (above). The Tim Holtz paper doll couple don't look very happy. This story came up in my head that he died on his wedding night. Or maybe it was all just a dream for him. Hmmm. You can decide. I really like how the coffin came out. I die cut it, then I ran it through a wood designed embossing folder. I used some scraps of copper paper to make the hinges, and on the same paper I scratched in the word beloved. I darkened it with a bit of black after that. The light is stamped (as is the quote) and all the flowers are fussy cut. The ones over the coffin were cut from acetate, and you can see it bit of it on the black.

   I was inspired by Maria's junk journal pages that she posted awhile back, so I made one myself. You can see it above.

  And below, I used a bunch of fussy cut and punched out pumpkins. I added the eyes on the hack-o-lanterns. The bats are all die cuts from a TH bat set I've had for a couple of years and had never opened. It was definitely time to use it.  Otherwise I did some fussy cutting and some paper layering. The quote is a sticker.

    These next 2 pages are basically sheets of paper I cut down to size and then glued into the blank board book I am using.  On this next witch page I die cut the witch and the trees along the bottom. As you can tell I only used the top parts of those die cut trees. I stamped the quote (and yes it's quite crooked but I didn't want to add anything else to the page) , but everything else was printed on the paper. The washi tape you see on the left side is actually part of the left side page which is still not quite done.

   I really enjoy seeing all the art people make using Lavinia stamps. I don't have many of that company's creations, but I do have  these 2 owls. 

    This time I painted my page black and then used the old tree part from a sheet of paper. I purposely tore it out and left the side edge shorter so you can see the black below it and the tear. I stamped the owls onto the scene. I did give the yellow eyes to the owl facing at you. I stamped the quote too. I painted the moon and the clouds with acrylic paint and also added a bit of yellow glitter glue to give the area around the moon it's shine.

   And there you have it. I might be late commenting on posts today as it's my daughter's birthday, and my husband and I are driving out to Keene, New Hampshire where she lives to help her celebrate. It's about 2 hours each way, so I will be out for most of the day today.

  Since I am not posting tomorrow, have a Happy Halloween if you celebrate. And even if you don't, have a great start to your weekend.