RavenWood Apothecary No. 3 - Bell Jars & Boney Maroney

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Okay...Today I'm posting pictures of the other areas of RavenWood Apothecary. In my home, the front door and entryway should open up with a view of a formal living room. But we are not a formal kind of family, so we decided that would be wasted space, so we turned our living room into a formal dining room. Then, I turned what was supposed to have been our dining room, into my studio/weight room/photography wardrobe/dog's room instead. But during Hallowe'en time, my dining room is magically transformed into RavenWood Apothecary! You can see it from the front door, and it's the first thing you see when you walk in the house! In that space is an entryway, and a dining room table, china cabinet, sideboard and piano. All of these images are of separate vignettes through out the space....but they all go together to form RavenWood Apothecary! There is a nice little path that you can take around the dining room table, that runs by the different furnishings/vignettes. That path allows witches and mortals alike to get a good look at all the magical goods. I've often considered having my Mom pass out the Hallowe'en candy inside this room, so that the Trick or Treaters could come inside and see everything.
But then my paranoia creeps in and I start cringing at the thought of hoards of strangers trekking through my house, and I decide it's best reserved for my close friends, family and party guests instead.
I should mention two things: 1.) If I didn't do what I do for a living, I'd really like to be a Set Designer for movies or a Stager for model homes (go figure), and 2.) After having viewed "Practical Magic" many times, I set about collecting Bell Jars, Apothecary/Candy Jars and Cloches for several years...and I have since amassed a fairly large collection.I never pay full price for them because often times they put them on sale at Michael's and Home Goods. In fact, you will see my prized one in the photos below. The Hubster scored this one for me last year when we were down in Naples during Sept. We decided to stop by a local Home Goods down there, and as always, I went straight to the Hallowe'en section and he went straight to the discount aisle. He screams for me through the store, and I find him there in the sale aisle with a HUGE Bell Jar in his cart to match the huge grin on his face! Of course I was like..."WOW! How much is that jewel?" And he proudly announces that it's a whopping $10.00! I couldn't believe it. That was the largest Bell Jar that I've ever seen, it was not broken or chipped, and it only cost $10.00! What a bargain!I had all kinds of thoughts running through my head about what monstrously big item/s I would be able to display in there. But when setting up the apothecary last year, I discovered that I had a very cool skeleton that was about 2 1/2 feet tall, and if I bent him up like he is sitting with his knees up, and placed his hands like he has them pressed against the glass and is trying to get out....then he will actually just fit in there perfectly. And man does he look awesome. So he really is the focal point of the table display. Of course everything in my Apothecary has a tag or label on it for identification....so his says, "Bambuti Pygmy Skeleton from the Congo Rainforest"....because truly, that's how big he his! (And in case you may be wondering...that black kitty in the photo below is not a prop...she is real. She's my evil black kitty and her name is Coventina. She does NO one's evil bidding but her own! And Beware! If you stare into her eyes....she will put an evil curse on you, so don't do it! If you try it in person...she will bite you first, then put the curse on you! You've been warned.) Another new addition last year was our acquisition of Boney Maroney! We took Boney M. home from the Spirit Halloween store sometime after the high holiday was over. They had discounted him a lot, and of course the hubby's 'troll senses' led him right to him...Ha! He is actually a really nice skeleton, quite heavy, good bendable joints...and he will stay in various human like positions.
So I thought it would be fun to have ole' Boney Maroney tickling the ivories on the piano. I plan to get put a hidden tape in there of "The Skeleton in the Closet"! Now if only I had one of those player pianos so he looked like he was really playing.... In fact, I've grown so fond of Boney Maroney, that I've been thinking of carrying him around with me this year in the car, and shooting pics of him in the different places we go....sort of like that Travelocity Gnome. It will give something me to post for next year's Hallowe'en Countdown!

This year's acquisition was this very cool metal library card/apothecary cabinet below that I found at Hobby Lobby. I got it when they put it on sale a couple months ago. I've put a few vintage poison jars and antique cans in some of the pockets, but I did not get around yet to creating labels for the outside to identify all the witchy herbs within....who knows, maybe I'll still eek it out before the party. If not, it goes on the long list of things to do before next Hallowe'en!
I also found this standing bird cage below. I'm really into the Victorian/Gothic look of Bird Cages for Hallowe'en....so I put ravens and owls in mine. I sort of have a small collection of these too, but I put them in different places around the house. But the standing one is set up in the Apothecary room where 'Sir Owliver' stands guard in the shoppe. I slapped an old clock on the side of it and draped it with dreary flowers. And above that, on top of the china cabinet, sits my other favorite thing to use at Hallowe'en, and that would be Clocks! The bigger the better! Okay...that's it for today's tour. I have a few more things to share, hope I'm not boring you all, but I figure Halloween Haunt photos are best shared around Hallowe'en, and I ran out of time to share any last year! Sorry! :o)
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