"Happy Halloween" -- oil on stretched canvas -- 30x40" -- Margie Guyot

"Happy Halloween" (Detail)

As a kid growing up in Iowa, I always loved Halloween. My cousins and I would make up the most fantastic costumes and go trick-or-treating weeks in advance. There was no special designated night for trick-or-treating back then, so we'd make the most of it, turning it into 5 or 6 nights. We'd go to each other's neighborhoods and stay out for 3 - 4 hours at a time.

Halloween was NOT a good time to live in or near Detroit, however. For 30 years I lived on the outskirts of Detroit, where the holiday was marred with vandalism and arson. They didn't call it "Devil's Night" for nothing. Thank goodness I moved away.

I wanted to include the two classic Halloween candies: candy corn and those horrible peanut taffy confections that came wrapped in orange and black wax paper. Ugh! Even as a kid, I never cared for either. But they do say "Halloween", don't they? Found a package of each at the dollar store. I checked to see if they were made in China (no -- Indiana). My holy grail was "Almond Joy".

Probably the first thing I'd found that inspired me to do this piece were the clear plastic owl trays. They came from a Charlevoix consignment shop. The clear glass-covered pumpkin dish also came from a resale shop in Ellsworth. As with most of my still lifes, everything either comes from a resale shop or garage sale. I love it: shopping roulette! I love the concept of trusting in the Universe to steer one towards things they need.

Don't you just love the warty pumpkin? Actually, I've been told it's really a squash. Today I'm going to bake it and maybe make a pie.

I've had that black ceramic cat teapot for probably 30 years. Love that thing. It's probably about the only thing I bought new, aside from the candy.

The first things I painted in this piece were the maple leaves. I knew they wouldn't last but a day before drying up. It's getting late in the season and I feared waking up some morning to find all the leaves on the ground before I'd had a chance to paint them.

Maybe working in the auto factory was a good thing in that it got me used to constant interruptions, struggles and aggravations. I've adopted 2 little kitties for the studio and they interrupted me constantly. Kept wanting to climb up my legs, sit on my lap, wanting me to play with them all the time. At the end of every painting session I'd have to lock up the palette in another room, as they wanted to walk all over it.

I included a close-up detail shot of Elvis, my favorite cat. This is the third time I've included him in a painting. He typically hangs around me all the time, watching and guarding me from errant mice.

"Pumpkins" -- oil on canvas -- 40x60" -- Margie Guyot

This was almost as hard to photograph as it was to paint! This image got cropped a bit. I use a little point and shoot digital to get my jollies with. I work from life, not from a photo. I only photograph things when they're finished.

These are the coolest pumpkins! All were grown locally, mostly at Bolt's Farm, on Atwood Road. We had them as decorations at Tapawingo this fall and my boss let me take them home. I knew I wanted to use them in a still life. I'll try planting the seeds next spring. I hope the deer leave them alone.

Everything in the painting was scavanged or haggled for. The table was from a resale shop. Finally -- a big table to put still lifes on! In the past I balanced a piece of drywall on cardboard boxes. The orange and beige tapestry I haggled for down in Peru some years ago. The deer antler came from a garage sale, as did the squirrel nutcracker. The ornate gold frame was from a resale shop and I found the wild turkey feathers out in the woods. Those prickly-looking doodads in the upper right corner are seedheads from cardoon flowers. The Mexican bat mask I haggled for down in Mexico when I was there last time, on a mushroom-hunting trip up in the volcano region, outside Mexico City. Ah, I love junk!

The one piece that inspired this whole painting was the orange plastic Jack-o-lantern Jell-O mold I got at the neighbor's potluck and give-away party! As soon as I saw it, I got goosebumps! When something gives me goosebumps, it's a sign I need to follow through with it.

Even the canvas itself was from a garage sale.