My partner finished her hobbit outfit so we took pics in the backyard together this time. Alex is a genius too because she set us up using photography tricks to make herself look shorter, and me taller. In reality, she is 7 inches taller than I am. She explained, "we'll do photo tricks like they do in the movies". This is just another one of a million reasons I'm marrying this lady.

Stay tuned for Bilbo + Gandalf coming soon. Happy Halloween!!

Just finished my Witch King pumpkin, doing Gandalf and Gollum next.

Well not just Moria, obviously - the whole lot!!

Photo: Me and my daughter in a theatre built into a natural lava tube (Jameos del Agua, Lanzarote).

I’d have paid good money to see a showing of fellowship here, so atmospheric.

Just the shire Lego set with some Christmas lights. Picture taken and edited on iPhone 18 pro.

Sorry, I found Voldemort before I noticed Gollum.

Is Gollum really an arch villain? Note they also have Sauron.

I wanted something special for my 26th birthday so my lovely partner and I ate like hobbits while we watched the extended editions of LOTR!

Breakfast: hashbrowns, bacon, chicken sausage, and a fried egg
Elevenses: poppyseed and almond muffin with elderberry green tea
Luncheon: french onion soup (this one was my favorite!)
Afternoon tea: lembas bread and hot chocolate (I opted for hot chocolate because it’s been years since I last had a cup)
Dinner: rosemary garlic butter steak, mashed potatoes with chives, and braised carrots
Dessert (not pictured): cherry pie with a scoop of vanilla ice cream, and mulled mead with brandy and spices

No second breakfast or supper because this was already a lot of food for us. Altogether, it was a pleasant day! Also, please let me know if I tagged wrong :P

Edit: thank y’all for the birthday wishes!

Been a while since I received these. Moved house. One thing after another. But finally they are up! I think they look pretty damn good!

I carved this balrog jack o’ lantern for a family pumpkin carving contest, and apparently we all tied (see other entries).

I was more excited to enter it into my work contest today, but the voting ballot completely left mine off and the lady in charge was too busy to fix it by the end of the vote.

I think it’s my best work and I’m so disappointed it got snubbed twice.

How does that work?

So Pippin asks how far Minas Tirith and Gandalf says 3 days, and with some movie magic they arrive quite quickly. This might be a dumb question, but knowing Pippin's character, did they hypothetically really ride for 3 days straight? I would think that he would want to stop for rest or food, unless Shadowfax can bend the feeling of space and time. I hope this question makes sense but I was just curious if off camera they really did ride for three days straight.

Found at Ollie’s in St Louis. I was worried I waited too long but I lucked out. These were the last of the box sets but there were a handful of The Hobbit left.

Because I'm a masochist with too much time on my hands, I decided my next viewing of The Fellowship of the Ring would be the fullscreen DVD, after I discovered from this video that while it cropped the left and right sides, it also revealed top and bottom areas not seen in widescreen releases.

It's an interesting way to watch the film if you're extremely familiar with the widescreen releases, as I imagine most of us are. The picture quality is of course poorer being DVD, giving it a rough and grainy look throughout, but the revealed areas in the top and bottom are nice to see, and it fills a TV screen in a way that feels weirdly like seeing someone you haven't seen in a while and discovering they've gone through a growth spurt.

The Lord of the Rings (Illustrated Edition)

Thank you to the kind folks at r/pumpkinstencils - this design came from that subreddit.

Shelob and a soldier of the Grey Host in the background. /jk

9KhS, Soviet chromium-vanadium high carbon steel blade, Caucasian Walnut handle, Brass inlay, guard and butt, Textolite spacers