Unquiet
Things

I knit a decent amount of things in 2019, but I did slow down over the summer when I was meant to be working on some other things. I still knit a little here and there, but I guess I was feeling guilty about doing anything other than the task at hand. I felt furtive and underhanded about those sneaky stitches, like I was somehow doing knitting crimes, and let me tell you, I did not care for that feeling at all.

The above Underwing Mitts, pattern by Erica Heusser, were knit at the very beginning of the year, before all of the aforementioned criminal stitchery. I think I actually cast on at the tail end of 2018, but they were my first finished project of 2019, so it counts, I think. This was the first colorwork project I’d ever actually completed, and I guess it wasn’t so bad, but it wasn’t so great I went back for more, either. Like most things I knit, I have since given them away to a dear friend.

I always love knitting Caitlin ffrench’s patterns and the exquisite Jörð was no exception.  I think I might have screwed this up somewhere after one of the repeats where the stitches doubled. My stitch count was correct, but somehow it seemed like…parts of the pattern…just…didn’t match up? Ah, well. I just kept knitting. I have no idea where this one ended up! To be honest, the homes in which the majority of last year’s knits currently reside is a mystery to me–I have forgotten where I sent them all!

Clothilde by Kristen Hanley Cardozo was a lovely and simple knit, or at least I don’t recall it being particularly challenging. I really don’t remember much at all about it. But it turned out quite lovely, and I was quite pleased that I had enough yarn leftover from Jörð to create an entirely new and separate thing!

The Swallowtail Shawl by Evelyn A. Clark was a pattern that was all the rage in 2006 or so, when I was a wee fledgling knitter. I recall seeing all the popular knitting bloggers posting photos of that one and thinking to myself, “lordy, I will never be able to do that!” I had quite forgotten about it until I needed a pattern 13 years later that would use a certain amount of a certain weight of yarn, and I thought, “aha! why not!” I wish I could say it was a piece of cake but it was fraught with the intensity of too much pattern left for too little yarn, and I actually did run out of yarn, with six stitches to go. Yikes.

Charade by Sandra Park is my go-to sock pattern, always and forever. This amethyst toasties now keep my Best Good Friend’s feet warm.

I thought the elegant geometric pattern of Amy van de Laar’s Deco City shawl seemed refreshingly different from the sorts of florid froofiness that I typically gravitate toward, and it coincidentally seemed like a good fit for some Shibui yarn that I’d somehow gotten ahold of (if you are the friend who gave it to me, thank you!) Not sure where this ended up, but it was a joy to spend time with.

I have Romi Hill’s Bitterroot so many times now. The first time I knit all of my grief into it, after a beloved feline companion died. This most recent time I sent it off to a glamorous friend. This was a humbling sort of project where I was probably overconfident and screwed something up even though (or perhaps precisely because) I’ve worked on it so many times that I should know these stitches by heart. It’s a pretty forgiving pattern, though. It didn’t matter in the end, and it was as beautiful this time as it always is

It’s the Charade socks again! I loved the demented joy and unhinged vibrancy of these colors, so I sent them away to an NYC witch who I thought might appreciate their twisted exuberance.

Andrea Mowry’s Find Your Fade, was, in theory, a neat idea. And I can’t say that I wasn’t warned. But this thing was a tedious knit and it is freaking enormous, and I feel like to give it away might be rather punitive to the person who must accept the gift, so for the time being, it still lives with me, crumbled sadly (and massively) in a corner.

More colors! I usually save the brightly colored yarns for knitted socks, but I had several bits of leftover sock yarn and thought that a colorful shawl might be in order–and from this sentiment, the Odyssey Shawl by Joji Locatelli was born. I often found myself losing track on this project; the number of stitches, the number of rows, even which side I was on! These are good things to pay attention to. I suppose it turned out rather nicely, though! It made its way to a writer and perfumista who I am hopeful might wear it every now and again.

I truly adored knitting Stoker by Kristin Lehrer. This was a soothing project, with the most beautiful yarn. The pattern was perfectly written and though it wasn’t especially complex or challenging, it wasn’t mindlessly stupid, either. Just a really, really nice thing to knit on for a time. It now graces the home belonging to a mistress of cake witchery, and I’d like to think it smells of warm kitchens and sweet frostings and gentle spices now.

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This is probably the type of thing I’d be writing in a written journal if I did that anymore, but I don’t. I have dream journals and planners and list books, and so on, and somehow the thought of just one more notebook piled up makes me feel a little crazed. I may be writing things like here this more often, these sort of “get it off my chest so I can sort it out” type missives and rants and rambles. Sometimes I don’t know how to think about a problem or what do to about an issue until I’ve taken the time to put it to words and read them back to myself. This is a habit I’ve lost track of and pretty obviously should pick up again.

It’s difficult to not take one aspect of something you do, and maybe have not done well (or maybe someone thinks you’ve not done well although you might beg to differ, but you’ve been gaslit and had your own voice talked over for almost 15 years by this person, so maybe you don’t know the difference anymore) and take this failure or series of perceived failures and not say I AM A FAILURE IN EVERY RESPECT. I don’t know how to let something just be that one thing. Instead, it makes me feel like everything I have ever done is wrong, that everything I ever will do is wrong, and it’s just a really awful, defeating feeling. Logically I know I am smart and clever, funny and kind, I know I’ve done some very good and interesting things before and I know I will again… but also what are you even talking about? I’m a big fat idiot and everything I do is garbage.

I thought in the past year I’d gotten to a place where I could step back and say, “yes–this was a bad day. It’s just ONE day. Tomorrow is going to be another day. It doesn’t have to be a string of bad days that turn into a bad week.” And you know, I was doing really well with that line of thought, but also, it’s easy to think these things when you’re doing pretty well in general.

This bad day was yesterday. When things start to go spectacularly wrong for me, I become paralyzed and weirdly hot and cold all over. My brain fogs up and I can’t think. This lasts for hours. In certain instances, I lose my appetite, and I can’t eat, or even think to pour myself a glass of water to hydrate myself. It’s not a panic attack; I think I might be too repressed to have a proper panic attack (that is sort of a joke but also sort of not.) But it’s definitely a scary thing I experience on occasion and I recognize it when it’s happening. At one point I told myself…just do one thing. One thing! Keep moving, even if it’s at a glacial pace! And I did the one thing. And then I did another. And then I sent an email or two, and then finally the day was over. I never quite got to feeling right again, but I did slowly come out of my freeze.

After a day like that, my first instinct is to turn off, zone out, have a trashy dinner, and maybe even a bottle of wine. None of those things are great ideas for me, personally, because it’s not-great decisions like that, that might turn a bad day into a bad night, and then a bad morning 12 hours later. I should have had some sort of dinner pre-prepared, which is what I normally do on Sunday nights, but the day before was Sunday and I was having a bad feeling about the week ahead (I wonder if that contributed to the bad day? Then again, I don’t think I believe that anymore. My thoughts didn’t make this happen. Thoughts are not things*. They are just thoughts.) I had a sort of “stick my head in the sand and don’t think about it” reaction about it and so that Sunday evening nothing of the sort done. And so after the bad day yesterday, I had chicken nuggets and tater tots for dinner and I watched Scott Pilgrim and Wanda Sykes and went to bed. I don’t know why I wanted to watch Scott Pilgrim, I don’t even like that movie. Maybe I just wanted to see Ramona Flower’s colorful hair and get mad on behalf of Knives Chau? Also, did you know Knives Chau was Jenny in GLOW? Anyway, one thing I did not do was drink a bottle of wine, so I guess yay, me?

I wish I had gone for a walk. I wish I had fixed a cup of tea and did some knitting. I think reading would have been out of the question because I probably could not have concentrated. But engaging in physical activity and having something to do with my hands would have been good for me. I know this from experience. And if today plays out in a similarly shitty fashion, I am going to breathe. I am going to have a big glass of water on a little coaster sitting close at hand. I am going to keep doing one thing and then the next and maybe stand up and have a stretch and do another thing. And then the day will be over and I will make orzo with shrimp, tomato, and marinated feta (which I meant to make yesterday) and go for a walk and listen to Misery on audiobook and dang it is so interesting listening to books instead of reading them but that’s a thought for another time, and knit a sleeve on the first sweater I’ve made in over a decade and And AND! Even now, even feeling like a bloated zombie who got too much sleep and ate too much processed frozen food yesterday and who is still utterly dreading the day ahead of me…after having taken a second to dump out this jumble of thoughts, I am able to think more clearly and I am getting excited about things.

I knew this was going to be a good idea. Stay tuned for more messy thoughts and stupid feelings and complicated emotions in 2020!

*RE: “thoughts are things.”  I used to believe that thoughts had that kind of power. But thoughts don’t make you sick, thoughts aren’t the reason that someone got fired from their job, thoughts aren’t what caused that horrible accident. It doesn’t work like that. Megan Devine of Refuge In Grief talks a little bit about this on her Instagram account (maybe it’s in her book too) but I feel like this is really important to remember:

“You cannot manifest death or health or loss or grief just by thinking about it. You are many things, but you are not that powerful. Your thoughts did not create this loss.”

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Throughout the year I keep an ongoing list in google docs of all of the movies and television series I have watched, and then I unceremoniously dump in on the blog here for posterity. This is not necessarily media that was released during 2019 (although some of it was) but 2019 was the year that I got around to viewing it. I don’t suppose this is of interest to anyone but me, but I do like to keep a record of how I spent (wasted?) my time during the year.

Standouts and favorites are marked with an asterisk, but I think what I loved the most were a handful of fantastical, eerie, enchanting television shows, and I am fairly certain they were all on Netflix: The second seasons of The OA and Dark, as well as the first season of The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance. In terms of film, I really did love Knife + Heart, and Into the Spiderverse was surprisingly awesome and a total treat for the eyes.

What were your film and television favorites from 2019?

Watched:
1/? finished Castle Rock S1
1/? Into The Spiderverse*
1/? Started True Detective S3
1/? More Frankie and Grace S?
2/5 Russian Doll*
2/6 Velvet Buzzsaw
2/15 Suspiria
2/23 Valerian
2/23 Lego Movie
2/24 The Hangover
2/27 Sorry To Bother You*
3/4 Tale of Tales
3/? The Little Stranger
3/7 Captain Marvel
3/9 The Order S1
3/10 The Nun
3/? The OA S2*
3/23 Us*
4/? Killing Eve S2
4/? Game of Thrones
4/3 Crimes Of Grindlewald
4/5 Akira
4/6 Blade The Immortal
4/7 Sabrina Season 2
4/11 Shazaam
4/29 Avengers Endgame
5/9 Pyewacket
5/12 Down A Dark Hall
5/16 The Favorite
5/17 Big Little Lies S1
5/18 Fleabag S2
5/20 Crazy Rich Asians
6/? Good Omens
6/12 Dark Phoenix
6/13 Maleficent
6/15 Always Be My Maybe
6/24 started Schitt’s Creek
July? Midsommar
July? Dark S2*
July? Stranger Things
8/6 What We Do In The Shadows S1*
8/6 Greta
8/23 SheRa S3
8/27 Dragula S3
9/6 Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance S1*
9/? Carnival Row S1
9/20 Happy Death Day 2U
9/26 AHS S9
9/27 The Accountant (don’t ask)
9/29 Training Day (also don’t ask)
9/29 Knife + Heart*
10/? Barry*
10/? Peaky Blinders S5
10/? Marianne S1
11/? The Good Place S1
11/? Toast of London S3
11/? Derry Girls S2
11/? NOS4A2 Season 1
12/? Castle Rock S2
12/? Lodge 49 S1
12/15 The Mandalorian S1
12/21 Ready Or Not
12/23 Cat’s Eye
12/24 The Rise Of Skywalker

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In previous years I have done year-end, wrap-up sorts of things on this blog, but you know– I just don’t feel like it this go-round. And not even because I’m feeling low, or that there’s not much to report on. There was quite a lot! It’s been an interesting year for sure–some of it maybe more than I even bargained for. But I guess we can never really know what we’re getting into, what’s in store for us.

I guess I’m feeling, well, that I know what I accomplished (and what I didn’t)  in 2019 and maybe I just don’t need to talk about it or share. And it also occurs to me that many aspects of my year remain a work in progress. I haven’t wrapped up much of anything at all! And I’m okay with that! And I will probably even change my mind next year, if indeed in 2020 I have a list of things to share. But eh, this year I will give it a pass.

Instead, just a few diary-like peeks into the last two months, a record of days.

As I have done previously in the past few years, anytime I am between more exciting projects, I feverishly knit a few squares for my baby sister’s divorce blanket. Her divorce was final two years ago, so as I say every time I bring this up– I really need to pick up the pace. I know! Also, the woman is almost 40. But I can’t not think of her as my baby sister.

In November I had a week to myself and I treated myself to a Fuck Off World! weekend, which I have written about before, but in recent years I like to think I have improved the formula. It still involves solitude and massive amounts of puttering, but instead of eating caveman frat-bro meals (I still love you though, Cheeto-burrito!) I have been trying to treat myself better by treating myself to proper meals. So I guess this is a “Fuck Off World! weekend–But Make It Fancy.”

Above is a bowl of porridge which you probably do not need a recipe for, a lunch of burrata and tiny tomatoes, broiled salmon and garlicky mashed potatoes with kale, and a loaf of cranberry-ginger bread that I made in an attempt to use up leftover homemade cranberry sauce. The recipe is actually for muffins, but I feel very this way about muffins ( but substitute muffins for froyo and donuts for ice cream) so I do not make them. Also, during Thanksgiving, someone complained about my cranberry sauce being too bitter and I’m still feeling peevish about that…don’t complain about my food to my face!

I am always intrigued by trendy hot drinks. I mean, I am also always late to the party, so golden milk was probably trendy in 2017, but whatever. Unfortunately, every time I have been out and about and ordered golden milk at a coffee shop, it’s always been pretty awful. Chalky and somehow both overly sweet and bitter at once. See how I did that? I waited til I was out of earshot to complain! Anyway, last month I found a recipe for it over at Pick Up Limes and it was actually really lovely! I’d also love to give her chai hot chocolate a try. Maybe later in January, while we still have some chilly days. Though it’s going to be 80 degrees on January 2nd, so who knows? That’s what AC is for, I guess.

Although I have not begun to read them, I am super excited about both of these books! Emma WhispersRed has put out an ASMR guide/memoir (?) called Unwind Your Mind and one of my favorite bloggers, The Ghost In My Machine has published a really fun looking little book, Dangerous Games To Play In The Dark. I initially found The Ghost In My Machine after hearing about The Elevator Game (where did I first hear about that? Probably Tanis, a podcast that freaked me out so badly that I had to stop listening for a while, and I never did pick it up again.)

Not pictured and which I actually am currently reading and which seems very, very valuable thus far: Pixie Lighthorse’s Goldmining The Shadows, a book for personal and collective healing. It’s available on Kindle Unlimited right now, and I have highlighted the heck out of it, but there’s just something about having a physical copy to flip through and underline with a pen held in your hand, marked passages to come back to again and again for revisiting and reflection.

Here is a quote that I loved, and which may not mean much taken out of context, but then again, maybe it will mean a great deal to you. It’s a powerful thought:

“No amount of punishing yourself will ever result in peace.”

I just purchased the book itself, and two more copies for future gifting.

Lastly, …speaking of gifting. Or rather, not gifting. Or rather, agreeing not to gift and then sort of gifting anyway: this year, in our house, we decided not to exchange gifts. It’s too much pressure and sometimes it feels a little wasteful (especially when you’ve gotten someone a gift, “just to get them something”) and it just ends up not being very much fun. Don’t get me wrong, I like gifts, and I am pretty sure that my partner does as well. But I think we have discovered that we prefer random, “just because” gifts, not this fraught, enforced tradition of family gift-giving that happens around the holidays.

Unfortunately, we couldn’t get his family on board with this idea, but since we are the bosses of our own household, we decided we’d control what we could, and concede where we couldn’t, and it would be ok. And it was! And after all that, we decided that we would purchase a Soda Stream-esque “sparkling beverage maker” (it’s actually by Kitchen Aid) as a gift “for the house.” We drink a lot of fizzy water in this house, and we thought it might be good to cut down on the cans and the packaging we consume, and the waste we create but also and more importantly I refuse to drink even a single drop more of a beverage that refuses to pronounce itself correctly.

Yes, these are the hills that I will die on.

As the last few hours of 2019 crowd in and remind me of all that’s left undone for the year year, I do not want to let this moment pass without thanking you for peeking in and reading here at Unquiet Things; for encouraging me and supporting me, for challenging me, for being my friend, or at least a sometimes acquaintance! Thank you and all the best, most wonder-filled of wonderful to you and yours–this year, next year, and always.

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I reckon I was not surprised to get an email yesterday from my favorite “mixtape” site, 8tracks, informing its users that within less than a week’s time, they’d be shutting down.

I’ve loved 8tracks ever since I first discovered it and it’s been the sonic palette upon which I painted a lot of my feels over the past decade, both those of profound melancholic and wild, ecstatic delirium. But nothing lasts forever, I suppose.

I used to make a habit of creating an ensemble for every mix I made, but then when Polyvore disappeared (ugh, so many shutting of doors in recent years!) I let that fall by the wayside. I haven’t much of an excuse as I found a site that’s every bit as good as Polyvore, but somehow… it’s just not the same.

In the spirit of those good old days though, here’s an farewell ensemble that I put together to pair with the last mix I created at 8tracks. Details can be found at urstyle.

P.S. I’ve just spent the last 8 hours importing all of my 8tracks mixes to Spotify, which I realize isn’t ideal, but it’s the best option I’ve got for now. You can find me here.

P.P.S. Curious about the art I used in my 8tracks mixes? I share a little bit about that over at Haute Macabre today!

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If I were to wait for someone to ask, “oh, Sarah, won’t you divulge your bedtime routine and rituals to us?” Well, I imagine I would be waiting a very long time indeed because unfortunately, no one ever asks me those kinds of questions. But I do enjoy talking about all things bed and sleep and dream-related, so I won’t let a little thing like lack of inquiry or interest stand in my way!

It’s funny how a lot of those zodiac memes like the above have us Taurus folks sleeping and napping all the time, our persons permanently parked in beds beautified by our need for comfort and luxury. That’s not me at all! Well, yes, yes, I like the beautiful bed part of that assumption and ok, sure, I have been known to hit the snooze alarm a few times– but I am not one to lounge and linger in bed once I am already awake. Once I am up, I am up! Otherwise, if I lay in bed not sleeping, I just start to feel antsy and peevish.  And RE: naps–I nap maybe once a year, at most. I understand that naps can be restorative, a good form of self-care, and for some individuals a necessity, and I truly do not begrudge anyone their naptime…it’s just…I’d rather be doing something. Anything. Even just puttering around! But preferably knitting or reading. Or cooking or watching a creepy film! To me, those things are almost as relaxing and recuperative as a nap, but I actually have something to show for it at the end of an hour– whether it’s a few chapters read or a few more inches completed on a handknit shawl.

I suppose that puts me in uncomfortable territory regarding our addiction to productivity culture and how we determine our worth and value based on our output and deliverables and what not. I don’t mean to do that. What’s right for you is right for you. For me, personally, napping feels like a waste of my time, and I’d rather waste my time while I’m conscious.

As I don’t nap, and I don’t linger in bed– I don’t spend much time in the bedroom other than my 6-8* hours of sleep at night. I don’t even read in bed! So the time I do spend in the bedroom is pretty special, and I like my environment and my rituals and routines surrounding that time to reflect its importance to me and to be optimized for how I like to best use the room: SLEEP.Perla Maarek for l’Officiel magazine

* I was routinely getting 6-8 hours of sleep until about 2 months ago, at which point I cut it down to five. The reason for this is because I wanted extra time in the morning while it’s quiet to get in some more reading and start the day on my own terms, doing the things that I like to do. Now I am reading that 8 hours of sleep is pretty non-negotiable if you want to avoid many deleterious effects to your health. Yikes. I’ve got to re-think everything! And I guess that’s what happens when you try to get more reading done

When I feel my eyes begin to grow heavy, or perhaps I’ve noticed that the hour is beginning to draw late, I have another handful of habits and practices I walk myself through before tumbling into bed:

-Fiber and bedtime vitamins! Yeah, I know, adequate fiber intake isn’t very glamorous, but I feel like once you reach a certain age (I’m not sure what that age is, but I am guessing I am there now) it’s just a fact of life. I mix the powdery stuff with water in a charming spring green juice glass embossed with enchanting scroll-y motifs, and pretend I am drinking a magic potion. Spellwork to keep my innards working! -Put my phone on the charger and curl up to do something gentle and quiet for an hour, with  a cup of tea (or sometimes a glass of wine, but I am trying to break that habit.) For me, “gentle and quiet” might mean reading or working on a hands-on type of project. Sometimes this is knitting, but I feel like maybe that is not the most relatable thing to keep bringing up, so let’s say that you’re preparing your overnight oats or packing a lunch for the next day, instead. Some people might take this time to journal or write in their planners for the next day. I think the point is to start letting your brain wind down, and you probably don’t want to do this in front of a television or phone screen.

One last thing that may be of use–do you perhaps talk in your sleep? Do you wake your partner up with your babble, but in the morning, no one quite remembers exactly what was said? Well, as they say, there’s an app for that! Do they even say this anymore? I am so out of touch. Anyway, I don’t talk in my sleep but my little sister carries on entire conversations that sound so clear you would swear there is someone else in the room responding to her. She began using a sleep recorder app so that she can eavesdrop on her nocturnal ramblings, and she routinely shares them with me for help with the interpretation or mostly, I suspect, for a laugh. She’s given me permission to share this one, (the sleep-talk is right in the first 8 seconds; afterward, it’s just snores and mumbles.) She’s pretty clear and lucid sounding, so I thought this was a great example of what you might capture on a recording but of course, your mileage may vary–you might be a mumbler or a whisperer. Or a shouter! I’m excited for you to find out. It’s a good time of year to cozy up and hibernate for a while, and while you certainly don’t need any of the things I’ve listed above for a good night’s sleep or to gain entrance to the Land of Nod, I am in no way an authority on these matters, listed above are all of the rituals and practices that routinely help me get to the world of dreams and wake up rested afterward. Let me know if any of this helps you–or if you have any tips or tricks of your own up your cozy pajama sleeves!

Bonus! If you are looking for a few nocturnal luxuries for yourself or a friend– earlier this week I shared a wishlist of sumptuous sleepy-time favorites…! 

A moment of whimsy a few months ago inspired my desire to build a dream shelf/altar (which I did not literally build, it came from West Elm) and which I have stocked with scents and oils that I use before bed, I have adorned with dreamy crystals and quartz with properties to assist in untroubled sleep and lucid dreams, and I have bedecked with blooms, that, while perhaps not associated with sleep, are shades of color that I find soft and soothing. A surreal little tintype by Wenzdai rounds out the menageries to remind me of the important symbolism to be found in the strange stories my brain cooks up while I am slumbering.

One last thing that may be of use–do you perhaps talk in your sleep? Do you wake your partner up with your babble, but in the morning, no one quite remembers exactly what was said? Well, as they say, there’s an app for that! Do they even say this anymore? I am so out of touch. Anyway, I don’t talk in my sleep but my little sister carries on entire conversations that sound so clear you would swear there is someone else in the room responding to her. She began using a sleep recorder app so that she can eavesdrop on her nocturnal ramblings, and she routinely shares them with me for help with the interpretation or mostly, I suspect, for a laugh. She’s given me permission to share this one, (the sleep-talk is right in the first 8 seconds; afterward, it’s just snores and mumbles.) She’s pretty clear and lucid sounding, so I thought this was a great example of what you might capture on a recording but of course, your mileage may vary–you might be a mumbler or a whisperer. Or a shouter! I’m excited for you to find out. It’s a good time of year to cozy up and hibernate for a while, and while you certainly don’t need any of the things I’ve listed above for a good night’s sleep or to gain entrance to the Land of Nod, I am in no way an authority on these matters, listed above are all of the rituals and practices that routinely help me get to the world of dreams and wake up rested afterward. Let me know if any of this helps you–or if you have any tips or tricks of your own up your cozy pajama sleeves!

Bonus! If you are looking for a few nocturnal luxuries for yourself or a friend– earlier this week I shared a wishlist of sumptuous sleepy-time favorites…! 

For pillows, we have a bunch of old raggedy things that lay there during the day just for looks, but as far as functional nighttime cushions for sleep, I also have a bunchy, insanely heavy buckwheat pillow for me to hug to my chest while I am sleeping, and memory foam Ghost pillows for our heads. I first slept on a Ghost Pillow at my friend Maika’s house, and it was a revelation. I immediately fell so profoundly in love that I ordered one as soon as I woke up the next morning. Highly recommend!

Upon my nightstand is a small stack of books, including a dream dictionary and: –Why We Dream: The Transformative Power of Our Nightly Journey by Alice Robb –A Field Guide to Lucid Dreaming: Mastering the Art of Oneironautics  –Children’s Dreams: Notes from the Seminar Given in 1936-1940, Carl Jung …as well as Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams by Matthew Walker, which is not pictured above, because I am currently reading it, and like I mentioned, I don’t read in bed, so it’s not even in the bedroom at the moment. Thus far, it is an alarmingly eye-opening read, although the author himself has suggested that if you find your eyes slipping shut and you nod off while reading it, he is fine with that, too! All of these pages are kept company by a small but splendid altar cloth from Poison Apple Printshop, a gently-scented moon phase candle from DeuxMoons, and a gorgeous third-eye sleeping mask from Sleephammer. Also not pictured is my dream journal, which doesn’t actually live on my nightstand. I record my dreams at the kitchen table, oddly enough. And I will share that I am not sure what initially prompted me to do this, but I take my glasses off while I am writing out my dreams, and because my vision is so poor, I have to scrunch my face down to about a half an inch from the page while I am scribbling. I look like a grade school kid taking a test and trying to make sure that no one is cheating off me, I’m sure it looks pretty ridiculous! Somehow, though, when I remove my glasses, and everything becomes unfocused and insubstantial, it opens the pathways for better recall of that unconscious territory I had just been visiting. It’s a peculiar little trick that works for me! Additionally, Naomi Brodner has a wonderful Dreaming 101 class offered via ritualcravt, where she shares some more helpful thoughts in this vein and some incredible insights and information in general. At Luna Luna magazine, Lisa-Marie Basile has some lovely ideas for keeping a dream diary, as well as other beautifully-written rituals and practices involving your dreams. Looking to the tarot to interpret some of the baffling and bizarre questions raised by your dreams? Well, perhaps you can ask Acanalogue!

A moment of whimsy a few months ago inspired my desire to build a dream shelf/altar (which I did not literally build, it came from West Elm) and which I have stocked with scents and oils that I use before bed, I have adorned with dreamy crystals and quartz with properties to assist in untroubled sleep and lucid dreams, and I have bedecked with blooms, that, while perhaps not associated with sleep, are shades of color that I find soft and soothing. A surreal little tintype by Wenzdai rounds out the menageries to remind me of the important symbolism to be found in the strange stories my brain cooks up while I am slumbering.

One last thing that may be of use–do you perhaps talk in your sleep? Do you wake your partner up with your babble, but in the morning, no one quite remembers exactly what was said? Well, as they say, there’s an app for that! Do they even say this anymore? I am so out of touch. Anyway, I don’t talk in my sleep but my little sister carries on entire conversations that sound so clear you would swear there is someone else in the room responding to her. She began using a sleep recorder app so that she can eavesdrop on her nocturnal ramblings, and she routinely shares them with me for help with the interpretation or mostly, I suspect, for a laugh. She’s given me permission to share this one, (the sleep-talk is right in the first 8 seconds; afterward, it’s just snores and mumbles.) She’s pretty clear and lucid sounding, so I thought this was a great example of what you might capture on a recording but of course, your mileage may vary–you might be a mumbler or a whisperer. Or a shouter! I’m excited for you to find out. It’s a good time of year to cozy up and hibernate for a while, and while you certainly don’t need any of the things I’ve listed above for a good night’s sleep or to gain entrance to the Land of Nod, I am in no way an authority on these matters, listed above are all of the rituals and practices that routinely help me get to the world of dreams and wake up rested afterward. Let me know if any of this helps you–or if you have any tips or tricks of your own up your cozy pajama sleeves!

Bonus! If you are looking for a few nocturnal luxuries for yourself or a friend– earlier this week I shared a wishlist of sumptuous sleepy-time favorites…! 

-Touch/feel. This is the year that I finally committed to giving our bed situation an entire overhaul. We had been sleeping on a mattress that was very, very old, and it was time to put the old gal to rest, so to speak. We replaced it with an Airweave mattress; which, if you’re interested, is a Japanese mattress brand–and it must be noted that this thing is very, very firm. I’m still not decided on if I love it or not but I am the kind of person who will stubbornly and relentlessly stick to a decision that I made no matter what, so I guess this mattress is here to stay. I will say that it is great for sleeping on, but not so much for lounging on, so it will definitely propel you out of bed in the morning. And because it is so firm, and in case you are wondering, it is also great for other things that people might do in the bedroom…but I’m not here to talk about that. (Not today, anyhow!)

We treated ourselves to super luxurious bed linens–actual linens— from House of Baltic Linen, and I will be completely honest with you here: they are not inexpensive, and you are probably going to wait a very long time for them to arrive, but they are worth every penny. Even my partner, who would normally never notice such a thing, remarked dreamily after climbing into bed “…these are so nice…” They are absolutely SO NICE. I previously had a glorious William Morris duvet cover, but I have discovered that I utterly loathe the hassle of dealing with duvets, and I also felt that it was almost a little too colorful for the space I was trying to create, so I found a nice, lightweight linen quilt from Brook Linen. I have the black variant–which, while I didn’t want too much color, I also didn’t want to summon my inner angsty goth teen with pitch-black bedding, either–but it’s been washed a few times and has faded to a nice neutral charcoal, and it is precisely what I envisioned that it should look like. Not a Crayola explosion but not too crypt-y, either. Maybe even a little boring. But that’s ok, I’m trying to fall asleep in here, after all.

For pillows, we have a bunch of old raggedy things that lay there during the day just for looks, but as far as functional nighttime cushions for sleep, I also have a bunchy, insanely heavy buckwheat pillow for me to hug to my chest while I am sleeping, and memory foam Ghost pillows for our heads. I first slept on a Ghost Pillow at my friend Maika’s house, and it was a revelation. I immediately fell so profoundly in love that I ordered one as soon as I woke up the next morning. Highly recommend!

Upon my nightstand is a small stack of books, including a dream dictionary and: –Why We Dream: The Transformative Power of Our Nightly Journey by Alice Robb –A Field Guide to Lucid Dreaming: Mastering the Art of Oneironautics  –Children’s Dreams: Notes from the Seminar Given in 1936-1940, Carl Jung …as well as Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams by Matthew Walker, which is not pictured above, because I am currently reading it, and like I mentioned, I don’t read in bed, so it’s not even in the bedroom at the moment. Thus far, it is an alarmingly eye-opening read, although the author himself has suggested that if you find your eyes slipping shut and you nod off while reading it, he is fine with that, too! All of these pages are kept company by a small but splendid altar cloth from Poison Apple Printshop, a gently-scented moon phase candle from DeuxMoons, and a gorgeous third-eye sleeping mask from Sleephammer. Also not pictured is my dream journal, which doesn’t actually live on my nightstand. I record my dreams at the kitchen table, oddly enough. And I will share that I am not sure what initially prompted me to do this, but I take my glasses off while I am writing out my dreams, and because my vision is so poor, I have to scrunch my face down to about a half an inch from the page while I am scribbling. I look like a grade school kid taking a test and trying to make sure that no one is cheating off me, I’m sure it looks pretty ridiculous! Somehow, though, when I remove my glasses, and everything becomes unfocused and insubstantial, it opens the pathways for better recall of that unconscious territory I had just been visiting. It’s a peculiar little trick that works for me! Additionally, Naomi Brodner has a wonderful Dreaming 101 class offered via ritualcravt, where she shares some more helpful thoughts in this vein and some incredible insights and information in general. At Luna Luna magazine, Lisa-Marie Basile has some lovely ideas for keeping a dream diary, as well as other beautifully-written rituals and practices involving your dreams. Looking to the tarot to interpret some of the baffling and bizarre questions raised by your dreams? Well, perhaps you can ask Acanalogue!

A moment of whimsy a few months ago inspired my desire to build a dream shelf/altar (which I did not literally build, it came from West Elm) and which I have stocked with scents and oils that I use before bed, I have adorned with dreamy crystals and quartz with properties to assist in untroubled sleep and lucid dreams, and I have bedecked with blooms, that, while perhaps not associated with sleep, are shades of color that I find soft and soothing. A surreal little tintype by Wenzdai rounds out the menageries to remind me of the important symbolism to be found in the strange stories my brain cooks up while I am slumbering.

One last thing that may be of use–do you perhaps talk in your sleep? Do you wake your partner up with your babble, but in the morning, no one quite remembers exactly what was said? Well, as they say, there’s an app for that! Do they even say this anymore? I am so out of touch. Anyway, I don’t talk in my sleep but my little sister carries on entire conversations that sound so clear you would swear there is someone else in the room responding to her. She began using a sleep recorder app so that she can eavesdrop on her nocturnal ramblings, and she routinely shares them with me for help with the interpretation or mostly, I suspect, for a laugh. She’s given me permission to share this one, (the sleep-talk is right in the first 8 seconds; afterward, it’s just snores and mumbles.) She’s pretty clear and lucid sounding, so I thought this was a great example of what you might capture on a recording but of course, your mileage may vary–you might be a mumbler or a whisperer. Or a shouter! I’m excited for you to find out. It’s a good time of year to cozy up and hibernate for a while, and while you certainly don’t need any of the things I’ve listed above for a good night’s sleep or to gain entrance to the Land of Nod, I am in no way an authority on these matters, listed above are all of the rituals and practices that routinely help me get to the world of dreams and wake up rested afterward. Let me know if any of this helps you–or if you have any tips or tricks of your own up your cozy pajama sleeves!

Bonus! If you are looking for a few nocturnal luxuries for yourself or a friend– earlier this week I shared a wishlist of sumptuous sleepy-time favorites…! 

-Cozy pajamas. I used to be super self-conscious about the size tags in my pajamas. Why? Who is even going to see that, and why on earth are they looking down the back of my pajama pants? And furthermore, if there is any time that you want to be comfy, it is definitely when you are trying to fall asleep at night. Nowadays I buy my pajama bottoms up to two sizes larger than what I might normally wear because, friends, I want elasticity and stretch. I do not want a seam caught up in my booty and suffocating my nethers all night long and I’m here to tell you, that does not lead to restful sleep. Buy your jammies for comfort! I cannot stress how much I love my Sudara pajama bottoms. I could probably wear them as loungewear if I were someone who lounges in public or actually even left the house in any capacity. But I also love this spooky-cute pair that I got from Target in October for 365 Halloween sleepy feels.

-Light stretches. I still don’t do any actual yoga. I’d love to start. Maybe in 2020, who knows! There are quite a few “yoga for sleep” videos on Youtube, which I’ve never actually followed along with, but there are two stretches in particular that I like and actually do, while lying in bed: the supine spinal twist and what I believe is called the “reclining goddess pose.” Again–I don’t know yoga, I don’t do yoga, but I think I am doing these correctly and most importantly, they just feel like a nice, much-needed unknotting before sleep.

Some sensory ambiance that helps send me off to dreamland, once I have settled in:

-Sounds. I don’t like to sleep in complete silence, and I love the sound of rain, so that’s my preferred lullaby. Sadly, it does not rain every night– nope, not even in swampy, humid FL. So we tune in to a rain channel on Youtube, darken the screen, and set a timer on the tv, and allow the pitter-patter of rain on celluloid windows lull us to sleep at night. Alternately, when I am sleeping alone, I play Mortiis’ Født til å Herske, which is one long eerie song, split into two tracks, of the gloomiest most monotonously marvelous dungeon music. Or if I’m not quite sleepy enough and I need a little extra help along the way, I will plug in some headphones and put on the WhispersRed ASMR channel on Spotify.

-Scent. I like a bit of fragrance before turning in for the evening, but your mileage may vary on this point. I think it’s either a lovely way to calm your senses with a soothing aroma or, the chance to try something fun and new and let it completely influence your subconscious for a few hours. I have written about some of my favorite night-time scents on my personal blog, in the past, and these scents are still some of my favorites! To this, I will add that LUSH’s Sleepy lotion is the loveliest sweet lavender scent to slather yourself in before burrowing under the covers. -(Inner) sight. If you find your thoughts racing and anxious before bed, you might employ a bit of visualization. These are two unrelated (I think) techniques that I learned from my therapist, but I typically bundle them both together at bedtime. First, I think about all the things that are plaguing me, and I open the hinge of my skull and pluck the items out, one by one (I imagine them as little people, pinched between my thumb and forefinger, wriggling with outrage!) I then plop them one by one into a jar, plink! –I envision an empty Claussen pickle jar, for some reason– screw the lid on tight and stick in the refrigerator overnight. Plague me no more, petulant pickle people! After I’ve ousted the rabble from my brain, I take a moment to imagine somewhere that I find deeply peaceful and soothing. I breathe deeply and spend time in this space. This is a technique that my therapist encouraged me to practice with regard to finding a “safe space,” but I also think of it as a space for giving my mind a bit of tranquil beauty before slipping away to dreamland. I have for some reason chosen to conjure forth imagery of places I’ve never actually traveled, but after months of nightly visits, I don’t feel like that’s exactly true anymore. They feel very real to me now.

-Touch/feel. This is the year that I finally committed to giving our bed situation an entire overhaul. We had been sleeping on a mattress that was very, very old, and it was time to put the old gal to rest, so to speak. We replaced it with an Airweave mattress; which, if you’re interested, is a Japanese mattress brand–and it must be noted that this thing is very, very firm. I’m still not decided on if I love it or not but I am the kind of person who will stubbornly and relentlessly stick to a decision that I made no matter what, so I guess this mattress is here to stay. I will say that it is great for sleeping on, but not so much for lounging on, so it will definitely propel you out of bed in the morning. And because it is so firm, and in case you are wondering, it is also great for other things that people might do in the bedroom…but I’m not here to talk about that. (Not today, anyhow!)

We treated ourselves to super luxurious bed linens–actual linens— from House of Baltic Linen, and I will be completely honest with you here: they are not inexpensive, and you are probably going to wait a very long time for them to arrive, but they are worth every penny. Even my partner, who would normally never notice such a thing, remarked dreamily after climbing into bed “…these are so nice…” They are absolutely SO NICE. I previously had a glorious William Morris duvet cover, but I have discovered that I utterly loathe the hassle of dealing with duvets, and I also felt that it was almost a little too colorful for the space I was trying to create, so I found a nice, lightweight linen quilt from Brook Linen. I have the black variant–which, while I didn’t want too much color, I also didn’t want to summon my inner angsty goth teen with pitch-black bedding, either–but it’s been washed a few times and has faded to a nice neutral charcoal, and it is precisely what I envisioned that it should look like. Not a Crayola explosion but not too crypt-y, either. Maybe even a little boring. But that’s ok, I’m trying to fall asleep in here, after all.

For pillows, we have a bunch of old raggedy things that lay there during the day just for looks, but as far as functional nighttime cushions for sleep, I also have a bunchy, insanely heavy buckwheat pillow for me to hug to my chest while I am sleeping, and memory foam Ghost pillows for our heads. I first slept on a Ghost Pillow at my friend Maika’s house, and it was a revelation. I immediately fell so profoundly in love that I ordered one as soon as I woke up the next morning. Highly recommend!

Upon my nightstand is a small stack of books, including a dream dictionary and: –Why We Dream: The Transformative Power of Our Nightly Journey by Alice Robb –A Field Guide to Lucid Dreaming: Mastering the Art of Oneironautics  –Children’s Dreams: Notes from the Seminar Given in 1936-1940, Carl Jung …as well as Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams by Matthew Walker, which is not pictured above, because I am currently reading it, and like I mentioned, I don’t read in bed, so it’s not even in the bedroom at the moment. Thus far, it is an alarmingly eye-opening read, although the author himself has suggested that if you find your eyes slipping shut and you nod off while reading it, he is fine with that, too! All of these pages are kept company by a small but splendid altar cloth from Poison Apple Printshop, a gently-scented moon phase candle from DeuxMoons, and a gorgeous third-eye sleeping mask from Sleephammer. Also not pictured is my dream journal, which doesn’t actually live on my nightstand. I record my dreams at the kitchen table, oddly enough. And I will share that I am not sure what initially prompted me to do this, but I take my glasses off while I am writing out my dreams, and because my vision is so poor, I have to scrunch my face down to about a half an inch from the page while I am scribbling. I look like a grade school kid taking a test and trying to make sure that no one is cheating off me, I’m sure it looks pretty ridiculous! Somehow, though, when I remove my glasses, and everything becomes unfocused and insubstantial, it opens the pathways for better recall of that unconscious territory I had just been visiting. It’s a peculiar little trick that works for me! Additionally, Naomi Brodner has a wonderful Dreaming 101 class offered via ritualcravt, where she shares some more helpful thoughts in this vein and some incredible insights and information in general. At Luna Luna magazine, Lisa-Marie Basile has some lovely ideas for keeping a dream diary, as well as other beautifully-written rituals and practices involving your dreams. Looking to the tarot to interpret some of the baffling and bizarre questions raised by your dreams? Well, perhaps you can ask Acanalogue!

A moment of whimsy a few months ago inspired my desire to build a dream shelf/altar (which I did not literally build, it came from West Elm) and which I have stocked with scents and oils that I use before bed, I have adorned with dreamy crystals and quartz with properties to assist in untroubled sleep and lucid dreams, and I have bedecked with blooms, that, while perhaps not associated with sleep, are shades of color that I find soft and soothing. A surreal little tintype by Wenzdai rounds out the menageries to remind me of the important symbolism to be found in the strange stories my brain cooks up while I am slumbering.

One last thing that may be of use–do you perhaps talk in your sleep? Do you wake your partner up with your babble, but in the morning, no one quite remembers exactly what was said? Well, as they say, there’s an app for that! Do they even say this anymore? I am so out of touch. Anyway, I don’t talk in my sleep but my little sister carries on entire conversations that sound so clear you would swear there is someone else in the room responding to her. She began using a sleep recorder app so that she can eavesdrop on her nocturnal ramblings, and she routinely shares them with me for help with the interpretation or mostly, I suspect, for a laugh. She’s given me permission to share this one, (the sleep-talk is right in the first 8 seconds; afterward, it’s just snores and mumbles.) She’s pretty clear and lucid sounding, so I thought this was a great example of what you might capture on a recording but of course, your mileage may vary–you might be a mumbler or a whisperer. Or a shouter! I’m excited for you to find out. It’s a good time of year to cozy up and hibernate for a while, and while you certainly don’t need any of the things I’ve listed above for a good night’s sleep or to gain entrance to the Land of Nod, I am in no way an authority on these matters, listed above are all of the rituals and practices that routinely help me get to the world of dreams and wake up rested afterward. Let me know if any of this helps you–or if you have any tips or tricks of your own up your cozy pajama sleeves!

Bonus! If you are looking for a few nocturnal luxuries for yourself or a friend– earlier this week I shared a wishlist of sumptuous sleepy-time favorites…! 

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I can’t even remember the last time I put together a list of fripperies! I say, it’s been much, much too long.

The theme for this year’s Hexmas holiday wishlist is “Hexmas Sleepies”, I guess! These are a few things I have either been lusting over, or, I have purchased and highly recommend, and they all seem to fall into that category of “soothing balms for frizzled folks” and for wrapping up the day on a lovely, luxurious note, before bed.

1.  Silk Ines pyjamas from Morpho and Luna. This moody floral pajama set is from Morpho and Luna’s 2017 collection and the design is apparently a modern interpretation of the mythology of Persephone and Demeter. For two whole years now I keep peeping at them but I haven’t been able to pull the trigger yet.

2. Unwind Your Mind. This is the book that ASMRtist Emma WhispersRed of YouTube just released and if you haven’t fallen asleep to the sounds of her brushing someone’s hair or perhaps her guided meditation with Tibetan singing bowls, you’re really missing out. My copy is sitting atop a stack of books as tall as I am, but I’ll get to it soon, I promise!

3. Antoinette Incense burner from Catbird NYC I just think this looks really neat. And none of my incense burners look quite like this!

4. Hinoki Onsen Shizumi Luxury Bath Salts with Japanese cypress oil.  These gorgeous bath salts are on my list as a “congratulations, you did it!” gift to myself, but I guess I haven’t done whatever must warrant doing because I still don’t have them. I will report back.

5. LUSH Sleepy Lotion At first sniff, you almost think this wonderfully purple lotion is going to be too sugary, but somehow it’s not. Sleepy is a lovely lavender whose sharp herbal edges have been tamed by rich and subtly sweet tonka, and trust me, you need the matching shower gel to go with this as well.

6. Parachute Turkish Cotton Waffle Robe. This robe is an INVESTMENT. It is the most incredible thing you will ever put on your body and I cannot sing its praises enough. If you have never ever before paid attention to anything I was trying to convince you of, hear me now: this robe is as luxurious as it is practical and you need it in your life.

7. Kindred Black Immortelle I have a few other offerings from Kindred Black and I am so impressed with the quality of the oils and the beauty of their packaging, and I feel like their immortelle oil belongs on my shelf (along with the jojoba, argan, and zdravetz, which I own –and love!–already.)

What’s on your Hexmas list this year?

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This past weekend at Haute Macabre I shared a list of eyeball fodder in which I reveled in revealing the artists responsible for certain artworks and photography that I’ve been collecting over the years, originally found on the internet uncredited or with the credit info incorrectly attributed (I am not sure which is worse? Both instances are annoying)

The above image, well, that remained a mystery. At that point in time, I’d had no luck and no leads, and was hoping that if I shared it, a reader might see it and say, “oh! I know something about that one!” It was a long shot, but you never know if you don’t put it out there…so it’s a shot I took.

This morning I had a response from an Instagram person indicating that the model gazing into the mirror is 90s fashion model Debbie Deitering and this looks to be part of an ad campaign from 1993 shot by Mikael Jansson (see below.) Since this particular image is so difficult to track down, they surmised that perhaps it was an outtake. Hm. I wonder! It is the closest I have gotten to an answer in four years, but still, I would like to know definitively.

I have attempted, in a limited sort of way (agents/agencies, intermediaries, social media) to contact those involved so that I might be able to get an answer and set the matter to rest once and for all. I shall report back as I know more!

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Weenie time, weenie time! It’s Weenie time at Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab! I think I can skip the preamble this year and get right into it. I mean, I could very well wax poetic about my love of autumn leaves and long, dark nights and bloody harvest moons and spooky Halloween feels, but I’m pretty sure you all love those things, too, just as much as I do! I am preaching to the choir with that sort of talk, you know? I don’t need to convince you.

Below are my “tasting notes,” if you will, on several greedy handfuls of this year’s Weenies: my initial thoughts, impressions, and reflections; the imagery and memories and stories and dreams that each scent immediately evokes. These notes comprise the raw material, which eventually gets incorporated into what I hope are thoughtful and cogent reviews. Think of them as “behind the scenes” (“behind the scents”?) peeks and insights, I guess! Some of them are more fully fleshed out than others and some, I’ll confess, don’t entirely make a lot of sense. Sometimes in the potent grip of a particular sniff, I’ll practice what I might chalk up to a bit of automatic writing and channel the spirit of the scent, the results of which I then reason with and wrangle into proper words fit for human eyes. Here today I have left them in their original, reflexive, stream-of-consciousness state.

Before I get into it, I will share one last thing: I am over the moon excited that I had the opportunity to sniff some of the lab’s Dracula: Order Of The Dragon collection (with amazing label art by Abigail Larson!) I have savored Bram Stoker’s classic vampire story on countless occasions in the course of my lifetime and I plan to do so again and again as far into the future as I am able. There is no tale quite so thrilling for me as Dracula, and of all my beloved stories, it is the one that has eternally snared the deepest, rarest love of my heart. This is the Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab collection I have been waiting for, since, well, forever and I feel very fortunate to share some of my thoughts on it with you today.

So…let me know what you think about this format! Actually, now that I look it over, it kinda looks… the same as the other BPAL reviews I write. Huh. How did that happen?? Well, I await and appreciate your feedback, all the same. And please do let us know if you have any favorites from this year’s Weenie collection! If you have questions about a particular scent that I did not mention below, leave a comment, and I’ll see if I can’t come up with an on-the-fly review for you.

And, also, wow…my preamble-less intro was a lie. Read on for the good stuff!

Les Heures de la Nuit (blackcurrant musk, white lime, and sparkling white cognac) Mimosa icing sugar frosting a tea cake? Cold black tea sweetened with a citrus blossom sugar?

Songs of Autumn I (sometime before: rain-damp grass and white sage) a herbaceous, purifying scent; hand made soap and icy, clear water.

Songs of Autumn III (dust and tumbleweeds, dry sage and chaparral, cactus nectar, and cinders) The scent of the absence of a thing; a melancholy, echoing pocket of once-was in a space where a thing was just-there. A faintly sweet, and slightly sad slip of void.

Songs of Autumn V (dry maple leaves, blackcurrant juice, patchouli root, and bourbon) It’s the sort of earthy-foresty-berried brew that a wood-witch keeps in a flask at their side for the revivification of lost souls and a nip for themselves on bone-cold nights. It’s probably about 51% ABV. I wish POM Wonderful made a version of it.

Dusk in Autumn (black tea, currant cake, mandrake root, a whirl of dried leaves, and hearthsmoke) Sara Teasdale made perfectly fragrant (I feel like the sweet comforts of her wonderful poetry were made expressly for this!) Dusky, musty, sweet autumn vegetation; the ancestral memory of smoke twisting up into a starry sky.

The Shadowed Veil (black pumpkin, leather, pomegranate incense, agarwood, and bourbon patchouli) a browned butter cake topped with autumn leaves and smoky icing sugar, served by the misty hands of by a solemn ghost; a widows (cake) walk.

Are You Digging on my Grave (snuggly musk, milky puppy breath, upturned earth, and a gently-gnawed bone) I was previously unaware of this poem, and the imagery plus the wonderfully pupper-centric scent notes make my heart sigh weepily. Dabbed on the wrist the fragrance conjures November-chilled cemetery gates, a frigid wind biting through woolen mittens, and an afternoon treat–a softly crumbling scone perhaps, wrapped in a clean cotton handkerchief, and stuffed deep into coat pockets for nibbling over forgotten gravestones.

The Empty House (black oud, woodsmoke, mahogany, pine pitch, and blackened pumpkin) the most delicious pine-log campfire coffeecake, enjoyed post-Wendigo escape.

Fall Leaves, Fall (starry musk melting into blackcurrant, black oudh, black roses, and blood-red maple leaves) this smells the way the phrase “a murmuration of starlings” feels on the tongue; spectral silhouettes fluttering behind closed eyelids in a cinematic sort of way.

Mictecacihuatl (copal, precious woods, South American spices, agave nectar, cigar tobacco, and roses) An intricately carved wooden tray with offerings of dried roses and fresh apricots, dusted with cocoa and cracked pink peppercorn.

The Listeners (mist-pale lilac, orris root, bruised violets, mugwort, white amber, yuzu, white champa, and white musk) Intensely aromatic dry, bitter citrus mingles with paraffin wax and fresh-cut, almost savory green capsicum for an oddly enjoyable scent that somehow smells exactly like the aggressively weird label art would have you believe it smells.

Pistachio Pumpkin Truffle an immediate deep saltiness, bordering on savory toastiness, followed by a wild, animalic chocolate. Like if cacao pods had scent glands.

Cozy Pumpkin Sweater (a dribble of pumpkin spice spilled onto a fluffy orange angora sweater) Ok so imagine that demented cashmere sweater scene from Lord Love A Duck but transplant it into the eternal autumn of the Sabrina universe. Pumpkin spices and that enchanted inch or so of knitted or woven fabric along your cardigan collar that even when removed at the end of the day, retains the warmth of your skin and the phantom perfume of your favorite shampoo.

Cardamom Cream Pumpkin Cake Cardamom is one of my favorite kitchen spices and, I think, one of the most unique scents and flavors that I’ve ever encountered. Woody, incense-y, soapy (is this just me?) and wonderfully aromatic–I add it to every “spiced” baked good I make, whether or not the recipe calls for it. In this instance, it makes for a warm, delicious fragrance, with milky-sweet aspects and a “fresh out of the oven” vibe.

Pumpkin Mead And Honey Cakes quintessential carmelized carbohydrates; the platonic ideal of a dense sticky, brown bread

Apple Butter Rum A fresh stick of butter, and a basket of fresh-picked apples. Later, these notes will come together in a cast-iron skillet and carmelize with sweet spices and a liberal spike of Kraken rum, but fresh out of the bottle, those two elements, the creamy dairy and the crisp fruit flesh, are so incredibly vivid and present and magically distinct from one another.

Sugar Skulls In The Pumpkin Patch Deliciously mouth-scratching Sour patch kids (strawberry?) + Downeast Maine pumpkin bread, the recipe I’ve been using from allrecipes.com since 2002

Miskatonic University Pumpkin Patch LILY–>GILDED Everything you love about the Irish coffee, dusty tomes, and polished oakwood of the original Misk U scent, added as an extra shot to a grande PSL. Somehow this really does call to mind a campus coffee shop for me (I went to a community college which I am pretty sure had no coffee shop, but I’ve got a good imagination.)

Devil’s Night In The Pumpkin Patch (a flaming pile of pumpkin guts, booze, and sweaty dark musk) A leathery dark musk, and the vegetal funk of clingy-stringy seasonal gourd innards. A crazy skeleton on a lurid horror paperback cover smells like this. Maybe this guy.

Popcorn Ball Snake Oil Popcorn is my favorite food. I could eat it for every meal. And while there are many “foodie” scents I don’t think I’d like to smell of, popcorn gets a pass. Hell yeah, I’ll smell like popcorn! This is the hot-toasty-salty-buttery-corniness of movie theatre popcorn, bound stickily with that sugary-resinous Snake Oil, which gives it a complexity and depth that you wouldn’t get with your run-of-the-mill, plain old popcorn perfume (because … there’s so many of them out there?)

Pumpkin Spice Snake Oil Here’s my Downeast Maine pumpkin bread again! But imagine if you substitute Snake Oil for the cooking oil (which I already swapped for olive oil) and the result is a sugared-vanilla incense-xxxspicy loaf (because I use at least three times as much cinnamon, too.)

Lollipop Snake Oil Effervescent, grapefruity-limey Fresca + a watermelon Dum Dum!

Carotene (sunset orange, a marigold-bright throb of light: sweet amber, ginger root, apricot, patchouli, red mandarin, chrysanthemum, and yam) if carrots smelled more like tangerines–fresh, citrusy, a little waxy; if tangerines grew up from the rooty earth rather than hung down from high, sunny branches.

Chlorophyll (dew-dotted grass, tea leaf, and sun-warmed herbs) Oddly enough, this smelled like a matcha custard bun when I sniffed it straight out of the bottle! On the wrist though, it is a riot of vibrant greens, from fresh tomato leaf to sharp ivy to sweet marjoram.

Anthocyanin (red musk, mandrake root, patchouli, pimento, saffron, red oudh, clove, and basil) Fall air rich with decaying leaves and cider-y scents and gorgeous spice and incense-saturated veils billowing in a sun-warmed October afternoon’s breeze. Like… if your very favorite head-shop had a stall at your favorite autumnal renaissance fair. This is basically the best of all worlds.

Dead Leaves, Cacao, and Sandalwood The most wearable chocolate I have ever encountered, sort of a dry, mossy cocoa chypre?

Dead Leaves, Nutmeg, Sweet Vetiver and Virginia Cedar I don’t normally love nutmeg, but this is such a sweet, simple, wholesome combination that now I want to start putting nutmeg and cedar shavings in my morning porridge. I also want to be the kind of person who eats porridge.

Dead Leaves And Chai Really lovely, reminds me of the enchantment of autumns in NJ. A sweet-tempered spiciness mingled with those manky, musty, softly rotting vegetal dead leaves–this is such a great combination. It conjures the memory of an evening stroll I took over a decade ago, on Halloween night. Without the slightest hint of a breeze, a whirlwind of crushed and broken leaves rose up from the sidewalk to swirl around my head. One smacked me in the face so hard it felt like someone punched me. It was weird and exhilarating.

Dead Leaves Green Cognac And Tea Rose Very-extra-super rose-centric! Damp rose petals, tenderly bruised.

Dead Leaves, Moss, And Mushrooms if there was ever a better argument for “more is more,” I don’t know what that could possibly be. My favorite “Dead Leaves” scents have thus far been those signature dead leaves plus some unexpectedly bright or springy floral pairing…but as it turns out, the very best one is comprised of a “like + like” formula. This one smells as if you had swept your favorite mug across an autumn flotsam of forest floor and brewed up in boiling rainwater all the sylvan sweepings you had gathered. Best served warm and cozy in tiny acorn cups, to ring of sleepy woodland creatures. If you love fall but you don’t love pumpkin, maple, or apple scents, I think you are really going to fall for this one. Pun intended–I always intend my puns.

The Country Gets Wilder As We Go (a snow-capped, untamed maze of fir, poplar, and oak. Ghostly beech reaching skeletal arms into the ink-black sky.) Sweet, peaceful mountain flowers.

The Meaner Things (thundercrack of ozone and moist, salty fog. A flap of leathery wings, a cluster of bark-brown feathers, and skittering, chattering black musk) A wolf in mermaid’s clothing; a subtly sweet aquatic for people who think they don’t like aquatics. Beautiful.

Wax Cylinders (polished mahogany, soft leather, and gold-molded wax) soft swirls of waxen, creamy, chewy, golden confections;

Death’s Head Moth (dusty brown sandalwood, nagarmotha, brown oudh, clove husk, white patchouli, black pepper, vetiver, green cumin, and ash.) Hand-made lace, only a little moth-eaten and musty, that has retained the gentle perfume of its owner –a combination of warm skin, fine-milled soap, and sweet, cooling herbs– a century later. This is an understated and sublimely beautiful scent. *I believe “nagarmotha” is a kind of cypress*

The Empty Coffin (dead roses, oud blanc, and white sandalwood) at the risk of sounding hyperbolic, this is the creepiest thing I have ever smelled. If you have ever sat, alone, in a funeral home and sniffed at the sterile atmosphere and softly rotting blooms, almost certain that your nose could eke out the decaying flesh and embalming fluid and grief and loss and heartbreak and terrifying dread of your own mortality, underneath it all. Well, then. I challenge you to dribble a bit of this on your wrist and try to read Dracula without going a little bit insane. (Edited to add: this dries down to an eerily beautiful rose.)

Flesh of my Flesh (deep crimson musk threaded with mesmerizing Tunisian amber, voluptuous champaca blossom, vanilla absolute, labdanum, bitter almond, and black orchid) This is a wildly hypnotic, narcotic scent; a feral floral with a hint of musk and talc.

Come, Sister (icy musk draped in osmanthus and white gardenia, a whisper of ti leaf and orchid, crystalline amber, and incense smoke) A chilly scent-scape of misty wheeling figures and transparent gloom, of intolerable laughter in sweet, tingling tones; the low voice in a dream that befools, and leads you from one nightmare to the next, promising weak light and wakefulness. A fragrance of lightly falling snow and beguiling madness.

The Sleeping Draught (a haze of lavender and black oudh, laudanum accord, and opium tar) first: sharp, somewhat camphoraceous lavender steam; later, a dark, sticky, honeyed sweetness, like opium manufacturers jumped on the cbd gummies trend. Ye olde-time sugar-dusted opium gumdrops.

The Sun Rises To-day ( blue lilac and violet leaf, white musk and eucalyptus, carrot seed and ti leaf.) Fruity amber, a lavender + violet tonic, lemony green tea.

The Blood Is The Life (blood trickling through thick, dark myrrh and a rivulet of unholy, desecrated sacramental wine) This is the deepest, richest, reddest, most indecent goblet of spiced wine.

Kisses for us All (red roses and honey, a throb of red musk, bitter neroli and clove husk all staining a slash of sheet-white vanilla sandalwood) Out of the bottle, this is very similar to the deep claret of The Blood Is The Life, but it shortly differentiates itself as jammier, stickier, and more floral in the way that sometimes tuberose smells to me like grape jellies.

The Embodiment of Funeral Gloom (a shroud of black agarwood, cypress, myrrh, and upturned earth, scattered with crushed lavender and creeping with moss-smothered stone) This is an uncanny creation and smells exactly like this passage: “Never did cypress, or yew, or juniper so seem the embodiment of funeral gloom.” I mean, that’s always the point, I’m sure, to have your work match up with your vision, but dang they nailed this and if you want whispering shrouds and grave tombs and misty clouds and ominous doom, you have come to the right place.

Lucy’s Eyes (a pulsing infernal amber, shot through with lilac-blue, bloodshot and blazing) Lilac and amber really is a strange and sinister combination! Miky green leaves, dewy and fresh, incased eternally in a glowing amber shrine. The amber lends a perversely sweet note to the potion, a sort of “evil Play-Doh” vibe. If Lucy rose out of her coffin and filmed a relaxing slime ASMR compilation for her YouTube channel, the shimmering ooze would smell like this.

The Black Phoenix Alchemy Lab Halloween 2019 collection of perfumes, hair glosses, and atmosphere sprays are currently live and available for purchase. As this is a limited edition series, sample sizes imps are not available for Weenie 2019.

Order of the Dragon illustrations by Abigail Larson

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I’ve been in a funny place for the past few weeks. Funny, and a little unfamiliar, and I almost don’t even know what to do with it. I’m feeling kind of …carefree? And generally good about life? Like everything might actually be ok for once and the world doesn’t feel like it may crash down around my head …any second…any second now?

This is such an alien state of being for me. And what makes it worse (what makes good…worse? Ah, Sarah.) is that so many people I know are struggling and suffering and just really having a rough go of it at the moment. I feel awfully guilty for feeling as great as I do.

I feel so great, in fact, that every day for the last three and a half weeks I have launched myself out of bed at five a.m. sometimes, at 4:59, before the alarm has even gone off. I’m immediately out the front door–in my pajamas, no less–to take in the world while everything is dark and quiet and still. I used to walk in the early mornings for exercise; it was a slog, and I hated it, and more often than not I would find reasons to avoid it and lay in bed for another few hours. Now I have begun to think of it as a gentle stroll to stretch my toes and wake myself up, and I’m finding that it’s become a really vital part of my morning. (I still get the stupid, sloggy exercise at night, though. Bah.) It may sound as if I’ve contracted some sort of passing mania, but I have kept this practice up for nearly a month now, even on weekends, and as it turns out, I don’t really need more than 5-6 hours of sleep a night. Which doesn’t quite sound right, does it? But I feel loads better than when I was getting 7-8 hours a night? And anything over 8 makes me feel awful, anyway.

I’m attributing this change to a handful of things:

-In late summer we finally wrapped up this interminable business with my grandparent’s estate, so after nearly three years, that particular dread is no longer weighing on my shoulders. My grandfather passed in 2015, and my grandmother’s decline was long and slow  (she passed in 2017) so between caring for them before their deaths and dealing with the  aftermath and the house and the paperwork and finances, it finally feels like I can let go and properly say goodbye. Goodbye, Mawga and Boppa. Until we meet again!

-I submitted some of the final stuff for a project I’ve been working on, and even though it’s not even close to being done, I think the most challenging aspect of it has been taken care of, and even if nothing ever comes from it, or if it all falls through… at least I will know that I was able to commit to writing 12 chapters of something. Yes, I am writing a book. Yes, this is what I have been obliquely alluding to since March earlier this year. Nope, still not really ready to talk about it yet.  But I will say this: be careful what you put out into the universe because sometimes you just might end up eating your words.

-I had a difficult conversation with my boss that I was scared to have, and it turned out ok…it didn’t kill me at all. Now I finally feel good about plans to eventually move to the West Coast, and hopefully sooner rather than later. Portland, here we come!

-Another thing I am loathe to talk about for myriad reasons is that I have lost almost 25 lbs. I’m actively working on just feeling better in general, and unfortunately, weight loss is a part of the process. I just want to be able to squat comfortably again, man. And I don’t even mean for exercise, I mean for when I want to squat down and look at a tiny roly-poly on the sidewalk or something. And maybe wear one particular dress I bought four years ago, but which didn’t even fit me at the time.

-And finally, I am fixing my teeth, a thing I’m terribly self-conscious about.

But listen: I may be in a better mood and I may have nicer teeth–but I’m still not smiling for anyone. No way, no how!

Oh, and another great thing is that I found a Heart record for $8 at a boba shop, of all places.

So, let me tell you about this sandwich. First, slice up a shallot and quick pickle it in a little bit of vinegar and sugar. Set that aside. Crumble half a block of tofu and saute it with some garlic powder, onion powder, pepper, nutritional yeast, turmeric, and a bit of black salt (it’s sulfurous and will make it taste eggy.) While that’s cooking, toast a few slices of sourdough bread, and when they are ready, mush up some avocado slices on them, top with a few spoonfuls of the tofu scramble and garnish with the pickled shallots. This was something I threw together last weekend, and it was pretty tasty.

Next, allow me to bring your attention to this pumpkin bread. I have been making it since 2002, using ingredients and directions from allrecipes.com, but which I have slowly been tweaking and changing over the years. I use half brown sugar/half white sugar, mostly applesauce in place of oil, and for the remainder of the oil I use olive oil, twice as much cinnamon, omit the nutmeg, add cardamom and black pepper, and sub in fresh ginger for the powder. I reckon it’s a whole new recipe by now!

Finally, this is a pumpkin curry I improvised when I realized I’d bought more pumpkin than I was ever going to eat in my oatmeal. (I always think pumpkin oatmeal is a great idea for like, the first week in October. And then I’m over it.) First, whiz up one medium onion, 5-6 cloves of garlic, one serrano pepper, and a knob of ginger in your food processor. Or, you could mince it all by hand, whatever’s easiest. Cook in the instant pot using the “saute” function for about five minutes. (I might do a few minutes more.) Add to the pot  a can of chickpeas, or if you thought ahead to cook up some dried chickpeas, add about a can’s worth, about 15 oz or so; a 15 oz can of coconut milk, a 15 oz can of pumpkin puree (not pumpkin pie filling) and a cubed sweet potato. To this add 2 tbsp curry powder, smoked paprika, salt, pepper, and fenugreek leaves. Or whatever you generally like to add in terms of curry spices! I just sort of threw in whatever sounded good. Stir it together, close the pot, and cook for 10 minutes, with a natural release.

I served this curry with short grain brown rice because that’s what we had on hand, and which was also cooked in the instant pot. Our formula for rice–whatever kind of rice– is to rinse it in cool water 2-3 times, drain and use a 1:1 rice to water ratio, minus about a tbsp of whatever (to account for whatever liquid is still left in the rice after the rinsing). Cook on high for 6 minutes and then do a natural release. Most of the time this makes for perfect rice. I also roasted some cauliflower that had been tossed with olive oil, salt, pepper, garam masala, and a pinch of turmeric.

For something that I did not consult a recipe for, it was really quite good!

This is a shawl that I knit last month. I think it broke me. It was the most epically tedious thing I have ever created. I was warned, going into it, that I was probably going to be bored with the pattern, and man, I sure was. The funny thing is, it seems to be a pretty beloved pattern among most knitters (it’s the Find Your Fade shawl.)

I don’t mean this as a criticism to the designer, but I wouldn’t recommend this to someone who enjoys the challenge of a more intricate pattern. Which I normally do! But sometimes I like to rest my eyes a little and not stress out so much about something that’s meant to be an enjoyable pastime. If you need something a little mindless for a netflix binge, this is perfect!
…but be certain that there’s at least 6-7 seasons of it because this knit is interminable.

In blocking this I noticed A LOT of dropped stitches. I think I got so bored with it that I just totally tuned out and mindlessly sped through it, without even noticing. I performed some surgery after blocking, so I think it’s okay. (Here’s a good video on how to pick up dropped stitches on a finished piece of work.)

So just an FYI: don’t daydream your way through this project. Check every few rows for some dropped or wonky stitches so that you’re not surprised by them after you have already finished!

Two movies and a cocktail: I did not do my thirty-one days of horror films this year; however, I did watch one movie at the beginning of October and one at the end, and I highly recommend them both.

Cooties was kinda funny and kinda dumb and a whole lot of fun, and I’ve been meaning to watch it for years now, ever since I saw that sonic creepster extraordinaire, Kreng, was involved in the soundtrack. It’s more or less about zombie children, and, Frodo, who plays the part of a failed writer who has to move back in with his mom in the town where he grew up, and is a substitute teacher at the school where the kids start getting freaky and bitey and gross one day.

Knife + Heart was a beautiful and brutal homage to the giallo film, almost entirely populated by queer characters, and I don’t know what I was expecting but I sure wasn’t expecting what I got–a dreamy, kitschy, sleazy, thriller, the likes of which I have never seen before. This one also has a pretty great soundtrack.

This is not a themed cocktail, but I suggest you pair either of these films with the rum Old Fashioned that this guy shares on his youtube channel (skip to 5:35 for the specific recipe). We crafted a few this past weekend, and I’m fairly certain that I liked it even more than a regular Old Fashioned!

Ok, so that’s it. You can all go home now. Oh, but wait! I got a fancy new mattress, too. Which is kind of hilarious, considering I don’t spend all that much time sleeping anymore.

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