Gourds, Jars, and Home Again

Yesterday, after leaving Tandi at the veterinary hospital, I tried to keep busy so I wouldn't miss her so much. I got my driver's license, filled up with gas ($2.60/gallon--down over $2.00 from a month ago!!!), hit the 50% sale at Michael's for more Halloween supplies, picked up 8 more pumpkins (and got soaking wet from the rain), and stopped at a cute little market across from the DMV.

I've wanted to see inside there for a while, so just decided to take the time. This was one of the outside displays:

Doesn't seem like much, does it?
Here's a different perspective:

That thing was HUGE!

Inside I bought some smaller pumpkins, and some Candy Crisp apples, and then look what I saw:

That teddy bear is a gourd! The lady there paints and carves gourds that her husband grows. They were wonderful. I put my purchases in the car, but then went back in and asked permission to take pictures of her work and post them on my blog. She was very gracious and placed her newest ones so I could get better photos of them.
Here are some of the many displayed in the little shop:


Isn't this a cute idea?

Don't you love this giraffe?

She was assisting another customer, so I couldn't ask her if that was 2 gourds together, but it would just about have to have been, or maybe three, I think.
She had several Christmas gourds:



Here is one I would LOVE to own:

And this one next to it is the one she was working on when I came in:


She doesn't blog (hasn't learned how to) but recently started a website, with some help from her family. She expected to sell one or two now and then to online customers, but someone ordered 20 from her, and she's working hard to get the orders filled. The Hummingbird one was $188.00, so it must be someone untouched by the sinking economy who has ordered so many!
She gave me her website address:
www.simplygourdgeouslive.com. She said to make sure you spell it "gourdgeous", because spelling it correctly will take you to a porn site!

Back home, after supper, I carved the toothy pumpkin:

Once I cut just past the rind, I found the natural green striations that determined just where the teeth would be. Then I angled the sides of the "teeth" to match those delineations, and scored the surface with the edge of a steak knife.

Tomorrow I'll put him, cardboard and all, into a large black trashbag and set him out in the sun, hopefully to warm enough to get moldy quickly. It stopped raining this morning, and is supposed to stay sunny through Halloween.

Then I labeled and filled some of the jars for the Laboratory:


I'm at a loss right now for how to label the two tall ones. You can see the poison label on the blue one, but I wanted to add something else, and to the green one, too. Any suggestions?

Today was spent mostly outside, putting up the dungeon wallpaper, setting up the ghost and two stunt tombstones, adding more to the lasagna flowerbed, and starting the spiderwebs. But I didn't get photos, because I had to run another errand.
Look who's home and all tuckered out:


The flash didn't even wake her.

As Tandi and I left the lobby of the animal hospital, whom did we run into but our own vet, looking a bit embarrassed. The assistant ran out to catch me before we drove off, since I'd forgotten Tandi's medicine, and I got a bit of the story from her. Seems Dr. M's dog ate lots of carpet yesterday and had to make a visit of his own. I didn't want to pry, but I have to wonder, since Dr. M brought his dog there, if the dog needed surgery. Guess even vets have pet troubles!