Wedding Day Ghosts

Weddings are times of great joy and a gathering of a mix of family and friends. In these next photos, it seems that  deceased family and friends enjoy being there on the couple's special day too.

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Do you think these pictures are fake or real? Leave a note in the comments with your opinion!

Spider's Egg Sac Decoration

arach·no·pho·bia

Pronunciation: \ə-ˌrak-nə-ˈfō-bē-ə\

Function: noun

: pathological fear or loathing of spiders

Arachnophobia is one of the most common fears among us, so it is obvious why so many decorations are based around the scary little eight-legged pests. Today I will show you how to make a spider's egg sac decoration that will make Aragog proud!

Aragog, the giant spider from the Harry
Potter series

You Will Need:

• A ball of any size (I usually use multiple golf balls for smaller sacs and one larger ball, like a softball.)
• A few pairs of white stockings (must be footed)
• "Spiderwebs"
• Fake spiders (optional)

First, cut the stockings at the length you want the egg sacs to hang. I usually cut at the knee and go shorter if I want to later. Next, you put one of the balls in the foot and hang the stocking from where you want the sac to be displayed, adjusting the length of the stocking as you go. After the stocking is secured, web it up with the "spiderweb" stuff, covering every bit of visible stocking but letting the shape of the ball still be round. Finally, you can add fake spiders to the sac, and be prepared to send all the arachnophobes running for the hills! (We really do love you!)

Martha Is Just So Darn Crafty! (The Magic of Martha #1)

I have a confession to make - not all of the decorations I use during Halloween are designed and crafted by me (like the Halloween Tree) or are store-bought (be sure to check out the new products from Spirit online if you haven't already done so!) Some of the best ideas are from... wait for it... Martha Stewart! No joke! I actually anticipate her Halloween issue, which is chock full of really nifty decorating ideas, so I am starting a new segment on La Vie Macabre, and it is called "The Magic of Martha"! Each post, I will share a tutorial, recipe, idea, or inspiration photos from Martha Stewart's Halloween section on her website.

One of my personal favorites from a past issue (Halloween Issue 2004, to be exact) can be found at her website's Halloween Central, which has hundreds of pictures of her own creepy creations. It is called the Head Waiter Tray, and this serving tray is a sure fire way to make your next gathering a bit creepier.

You Will Need:

• 10 paper towels (crumpled)
• Enough swaths of gauze to cover the display surface of the tray
• Brewed coffee or strong black tea
• Two tablespoons flour
• One tablespoon corn syrup or Mod Podge glue
• Craft stick
• Styrofoam head (A cheap one can be purchased at Sally's Beauty online for $3.99)

You will start by dipping the paper towels and gauze in the coffee or tea, wringing them out of they don't have any extra liquid, crumpling them up, and leaving them to dry for a couple of days while they are still crumpled. You will have to wait two days or so before they dry, but when they do, you mix the solution of two tablespoons flour, one tablespoon tea or coffee, and one tablespoon of corn syrup or Mod Podge. Mix the ingredients together with a craft stick, and you apply the mixture in a thin layer on one section of the head. This is when you take the dried paper towels, uncrumple them, tear them into smaller pieces or strips, and spread over the section of the head. Repeat until the head is covered, and then arrange the gauze at the base of the head on the tray. You are now ready to serve your guests in a scary style!

If you want more detailed instructions or would rather watch an instructional video, here is the original post on Martha's website.

First Encounters With Horror

I was recently talking to a friend about the first time we saw a horror/thriller movie and how old we were. She recalls being frightened by the first horror movie she saw and not being able to sleep for many nights afterwards, but I had a very different experience.

Even though I don't know which one I saw first, the first horror/thriller films that I watched were Psycho (1960) and The Sixth Sense (1999). I saw them about the same time when I was about seven years old, and I remember watching them in the comfort of my own living room with my parents. They warned me before both movies that they weren't real and that they could turn it off if I got scared, but to their surprise, I loved them.

What were the first horror movies that you saw as a child, and how old were you?

New 2010 Halloween Decorations From Spirit Halloween

At Spirit Halloween, they recently revealed the new decorations for Halloween 2010! There are 101 new decorations, prices ranging from $0.99 (here and here) to $299.99. Here are some of my favorites from the bunch.

$4.99

$34.99

$34.99

$9.99

$7.99

The Halloween Tree

Ever since my earliest memories, Halloween was my favorite holiday. No doubt about it. Not even the family and presents of Christmas or the general Irish-ness of St. Patrick's Day with my family could hold a candle to October 31st.

Now, I started planning the decorations for my front yard on November 1st, nearly a whole year before Halloween. With all the anticipation and planning, I usually became anxious to start physically decorating in September, but my mother usually persuaded me to wait until the first weekend of October so our neighbors wouldn't think we were freaks. Whatever...

My yard has a teen-aged Bradford Pear Tree in it, and by October, the leaves are beginning to turn into a fiery red color sprinkled with a few harvest yellow leaves. Keep in mind that something has been interfering with the growth of my tree, causing the branches to be sparser and more spread out than normal, but that makes it an excellent tree to hang decorations from.

Halloween Tree Tutorial

Start by finding a tree that has low branches that aren't too large or too weak. Once the tree is selected, you can find assorted Halloween decoration that you can hang from the lower branches of the trees.

I usually start by disassembling these skeletons from the main garland so that they are all separate, and then I hot glue the tops of individual skeletons to all-natural hemp twine, and after allowing the glue to dry, I hang the skeletons from the branches.

Skeletons on garland.

Next, I like to find skulls to put on the tree. I had a garland much like the one shown below, and I disassembled the individual skulls from the rest of the garland and glued twine to the bottom of each skull, and after setting the skulls on the branch, I tie the twine underneath, securing it in place on the branch.

Skull garland

I also have some very nice flying witch decorations that hang, and they look very nice on the tree as well. Just find a sturdy branch and hang her.

I love this decoration!

Another great decoration to add is a braid of garlic. This website has a phenomenal tutorial on how to make a garlic braid, even though I don't usually make mine that large. You can attach the garlic braid to the tree by using twine.

Mine are usually about half this size

You can also hang bunches of dried flowers and plants for an earthy feel.

Another decoration that you can add that gives the tree a new level of creepiness is that fibrous spiderweb stuff. You know what I'm talking about. 

You can add in small spiders to the spiderwebs.

You can also find these realistic crows that you can easily attach to thicker branches. They come with wire attached to their feet, so all you have to do is wrap the wire around the tree.

From just a few feet away, these birds look creepily real

Those are my staples for my Halloween Tree, but you can find even more creepy decorations to put in yours, such as shrunken heads, bags of bones, ghosts, and carved turnips. Happy decorating!

Gothic Italian Vogue Fashion Shoot

Feast your eyes upon the Gothic fashions featured in an Italian Vogue from June 2008. Clothes featured are from lines from Yves Saint Laurent, Yohji, and Nina Ricci; and the editorial was shot by Craig McDean. Enjoy the dark Victorian beauty of macabre fashion!

Welcome!

Welcome to my blog, La Vie Macabre! It is a blog dedicated to the stranger and darker things in life, from ghosts to skulls to dark magic to Halloween. The blog's name came from a stroke of inspiration that I had while listening to the song Danse macabre by the French composer Camille Saint-Saëns (see video below, you might want to pause music player at bottom of page also if you haven't already done so.)

Danse macabre roughly translates to "Dance of Death" in English, and as poetic as that is, I didn't want to name my blog a name that is commonly used, from paintings to books to music to poetry. That is when I thought of La Vie Macabre, which translates to "Life of Death", a phrase that seems to contradict itself, but illustrates my fascination with the weird, mystical, and dead. Hopefully through this blog I will share with you my own life of death, and I hope that you will enjoy!