Day 10 ~ Spirit Meet Ups!

Hello and welcome to Day 10! Are you still with us? Are you still excited to see what we may be bringing your way? Well, we here at Samhain's Sirens are looking forward to sharing much more with you as we go along through the rest of the month. Today's entry is by our very own Samantha Curtin who writes Bones, Buried Treasures and Beliefs. She's going to be giving us her experience with Spirit Meet Ups! It's a two part story so make sure you come back tomorrow for the conclusion.

Spirit Meet Ups!

Spirit Meetups: Part 1

By: Sam Curtin

From a young age I have had encounters with the paranormal ranging from feelings in places to full on contact with apparitions. When I was younger, before I was able to walk, it was not rare for me to stare off into the corner of a room and not turn my head for hours. My mom wondered many times what exactly I was looking at but she usually just shrugged it off. I vaguely remember encounters when I was younger of talking to voices that weren’t attached to anyone around me but nothing that I can really put my finger on.

The first spirit encounter I vividly remember came during a slumber party at my friend’s house when I was around the age of 10 or so. It was a normal young girl’s slumber party; we had junk food, did make up, and played truth or dare. When it came to my turn to play truth or dare I was dared to be the last one in the group on our excursion through the woods behind my friend’s house. Being the fearless little girl I was, I accepted.  We then journeyed out into the woods behind her house in the dark with only two people at the front of the group with flash lights. The moon was really the only thing that lit my path since I was at the back while we walked through the woods and about 5 minutes into the walk a started to feel really uneasy. Now it’s important to point out that there are very few things that I am afraid of (tunnels topping that list) so when I get a bad feeling, it’s bad.

About a minute or so after that initial feeling, something took hold of my arm. It was if someone had stuck their hand in ice water and then wrapped it around my right bicep. I looked behind me expecting to see someone standing there, but there was nothing in the dark woods. This stopped me right in my tracks and everyone else soon stopped too when I did. I was suddenly frozen in fear as it felt like something was tugging me back towards the house. I couldn’t communicate to any of my friends what I was feeling and they all rushed over to me as they saw the look of terror on my face. My one friend suggested we just go back into the house and as soon as she said that the hand let go of me. Relief flooded into me as we then walked back into the house and carried on with the rest of the party.

I was afraid my friends wouldn’t believe me with what I experienced so I just told them the dark woods made me afraid and that’s why I froze. They thought this strange since I was never scared of the dark before. We soon forgot all about it and drifted off to sleep. The next morning when we were packing up to all go back to our respective houses; my friend’s mom had the news on. The top story was about how a man in the neighborhood over from my friend’s house had gotten drunk and killed his wife. That neighborhood was directly in the path of where we were walking towards that night in the woods. It was at that point that I realized something was trying to protect me. This was my first manifestation of my protection spirit.

Talking about the spirits that I encountered was never something that I did. A couple of times I mentioned hearing strange voices in the house to my mom and she just figured I was making up things. The thing I remember most about the hauntings in our house growing up was the sound of walking up the steps to the third floor. Everyone in my family has very distinct footsteps and these were never any that belonged to my family but they were always the same.

Over the years it became part of my life that if I walked into an area that was haunted, whatever was there would make itself known to me. It ranged from moving of objects, whispering in my ear, flickering lights and a few times showing itself as a shadow or even a full apparition. This was just part of my life and nothing bad ever happened; in fact having these experiences comforted in me in a way.

These encounters started to become more prevalent as a got older, learned more about what was happening to me and became completely open to communicating with the spirit world. When I went to college up at Penn State, the encounters doubled.

Tomorrow, we will continue with part 2 of the story...

Today's Giveaway

Today we have another autographed print from Sabrina over at The Ink Witch. And if you know Sabrina even the tiniest bit, you know as with all our Crafty Siren's, she puts her heart and soul into every piece she creates. 

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Go to The Ink Witch  and peruse her wares. Come back and tell us what you like best there.

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Today's Recipe 

Picture Credit Food Network

Crispy Phyllo Wrapped Hot Dog Mummies

from Food Network 

No need to be too meticulous when wrapping these spooky versions of pigs in blankets; the raggedy look suits the mummy theme to a "tee."

Ingredients

One 16-ounce package bun-size hot dogs (8 hot dogs), each halved crosswise

2 ounces Cheddar, cut into 16 thin slices

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

1/4 teaspoon garlic powder

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

8 sheets phyllo dough

4 ounces (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted

Ketchup, yellow mustard, barbecue sauce or your favorite dipping sauce, for serving and decorating

Directions

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F and line a rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper. Cut a slit in each hot dog piece and stuff with a slice of cheese. Set aside. Combine the salt, garlic powder and pepper in a small bowl.

Working with one sheet of phyllo at a time and keeping the rest covered under a damp towel or paper towels, lay a phyllo sheet on a large cutting board or counter and lightly brush with melted butter. Lightly sprinkle with some of the spice mix and fold in half lengthwise. Brush the top with more melted butter and cut into 1/2-inch-thick strips. Using 2 pieces of stuffed hot dogs per phyllo sheet, wrap half of the strips around each piece of hot dog to create a mummy look. Leave a small section of hot dog exposed towards the top so it looks like the top part of the face peeking out from the phyllo wrappings. Don't worry about frayed edges or tears-- it will add to the mummy look.

Place on the prepared baking sheet and repeat with the remaining phyllo, melted butter, spice mix and hot dogs. Remelt the butter if it cools down too much while forming the mummies.

Bake until the phyllo is crisp and golden brown, about 25 minutes. If desired, dot ketchup or mustard eyes on each mummy using a toothpick and serve with extra sauces for dipping.

The Craft of the Day

Floating Ghost 

All Kids Network

We were in need of some new Halloween decorations for our yard this year, so we created some ghost crafts to hang from the trees. Our daughter loved making this craft. First we got to cut up an old t-shirt, then we got to paint it with glue, and when it was dry she had a blast “flying” the ghost through the house yelling “oooooo!”. When she was finally done playing we hung it from the tree outside. This cute ghost craft is sure to entertain your kids.

What you'll need:

Piece of white fabric (we used an old t-shirt)

Glass

Glue

Water

Paint brush

Marker

String or yarn

How to make your Floating Ghost Craft:

Cut an old t-shirt so that you have a square piece of white fabric big enough to fit over your glass.

Turn the glass upside down and drape the fabric over the glass. We used one made out of glass, but we’re sure plastic will work also.

Pour some glue into a separate container (we used an empty baby food container for this messy part). You need a good amount of glue. Add a little bit of water to thin it out. You want to be able to easily stir the glue with a paint brush but still want the paint brush to be coated white when you pull it out of the mixture.

Paint the glue mixture onto the fabric as it sits over the glass. If you don’t get to the very edges of the fabric it is ok. The parts that aren’t covered in glue will be more “flowy” than the parts that are, and the bottom of a ghost is supposed to be like that!

Set the project aside to completely dry.

Once the fabric is dry, peel the fabric off the glass (the glass is not part of the finished craft). Have an adult use a knife or a pair of scissors to poke a small hole in the top of the ghost and thread a piece of yarn or string through it (knot it underneath) so you can hang your ghost up.

Use a marker to draw on a face.

Hang up your ghost for a less-than-spooky decoration.

 The October 8th winner of the Gift Certificate from East Coast Craft & Curio is Tracy Beatch. 

Please don't forget to send us an email with your name, shipping details, etc... so our lovely vendor sirens can send you your goodies :)

Song of the Day as chosen by Kestril Trueseeker

For many folks Night on Bald Mountain is forever linked to Disney’s Fantasia. The original composer, Modest Mussorgsky, wrote it to be part of an opera based on a play called The Witch and that piece was supposed to depict a witches’ Sabbat. Mussorgsky was crushed when his mentor expressed his disdain for the piece. It was never played in his lifetime. Night on Bald Mountain was brought to life again after being edited by another Russian composer, Nikolai Andreyevich Rimsky-Korsakov to become the version we typically hear today.

See you tomorrow!!