First Impressions

Yesterday was my second dentist appointment in as many days. Going to the dentist twice a month is bad enough. Going to the dentist twice in one week, two days in a row, is not exactly my idea of a wonderful time.

But I'm finally nearing the end of my dental work. This week they prepped me for the first of three crowns. That naturally involved cutting down the tooth, making a temporary crown, and taking the impression for the permanent one. It took my dentist three attempts to get an impression for the crown. My mouth just didn't want to cooperate. On the list of disgusting things I have personally experienced, the impression goo is probably number 3. It's like the bastard child of a bottle of mint pepto bismol and the pink ooze from Ghostbusters. It expands in a rather horrifying way and creeps its cold, gooey way towards the back of its unsuspecting victim's throat. When it's removed, it feels as though it's trying to take all of your teeth with it.

So now I have a temporary crown cemented to my tooth, and it's bothering me to no end. It feels like a hardened old piece of gum has been wrapped around my molar. I'm stuck with it for a week and a half. I can't stop worrying at it with my tongue. I know I shouldn't, but I can't help myself. It's just so obviously there that I find myself poking at it constantly.

Now I just have to go through this two more times, and I'll be done. Done with a capital D. I don't know what I'll do with myself when I don't have to go to the dentist so much.

I wonder if they'll let me keep the temporary crowns so I can burn them when I'm finally finished?

Something Witchy This Way Comes...

In keeping with my earlier post about halloween, I decided to share some of my latest projects.

This is one of my small cemetery pendants:

The Jack-O-Lantern, complete with bats:

A two-piece cemetery necklace:

One of the crocheted witch dolls:

and a "witch-o-lantern" hair stick:

My new bottle of etching solution is on its way, so I'll be able to make some more halloween jewelry when it gets here. I'm also working on a standing witch holding a broom, and a pumpkin patch of crocheted jack-o-lanterns. I'm selling the jewelry in my etsy store, but not the dolls. They don't fit with my other stuff, really, and I don't have the time to handle two shops and making stock for them.

This Is Halloween

I know that it's a little early yet, but I'm feeling impatient for fall to get here. The stores have just started to get their halloween stock in, and it's a nice thing to see. Hobby Lobby is overflowing with garlands of silk leaves in autumn colors. Scarecrows sit beside pumpkins and black cats. TJ Maxx, which is perhaps my favorite store in the world, got their halloween goodies in a couple of weeks ago. Pumpkin spice candles are everywhere.

I love it when the season starts to edge its way into coolness. The mornings have been ever so slightly chilly here, though we've a few weeks to go before it truly starts to change. I want the colorful leaves and the crisp, apple-bite air.

In the spirit of the coming season, I've already started making halloween things. I've started etching copper more and more, and have created haunted graveyard scenes and grinning jack-o-lanterns surrounded by clouds of bats. I'm in the mood to crochet scarves with little pumpkin bobbles amongst the fringe. I've already started making my yearly coven of witch dolls.

This has been an unusual year so far with the weather. It's already cooler than normal, with more rain than we usually get. The fog has been thick every night. Our weatherman has been predicting a dire winter, as he does every year, but this might be the one year he's right.

But in the meantime, I'll continue to count down the days until fall is well and truly here, and I can decorate my desk at work with witches and jack-o-lanterns.