This post deals with the paranormal, just so you know before reading it

[Misanthropical]

My sons and I noticed a huge upswing of paranormal activity (NOT the movie, which sucked) in our home. I told my boys that it is like Grand Central Station for spirits here. We were all I know it's not subject I want to bring up to my pastor, so I find a Wiccan who can see auras and is more attune to the paranormal than I am. Also, so you know, I didn't pay here a dime, she was helping me out for free and never once asked for a cent. She told me my boys and I are not crazy that activity has been picking up and the spirits who showed up at my home were probably just passing through. She said to bake something sweet for them like cookies and put out large glass of wine with the cookies. I was then to tell the spirits it was for them and to enjoy it and move on in their travels. The next day I was to crumble up the sweets and put it in the back yard and pour out the wine there too.

She also told me that Mr. Mis, the boys and my aura are clear, so nothing bad is around my family. That was a huge relief since I did worry about that.

So, that is what I did. When I put out the wine and cookies and told the spirits to enjoy because it was it for them, the activity took a upswing, like they were telling me they heard what I said. Later that night, I was washing my hands in the kitchen sink when the bread and stuffing box that were in the middle of a counter behind me were thrown on the floor. I was the only one in the kitchen, so I just picked the stuff up.and told them to stop making a mess.

The next day, I put the stuff in the back yard and the activities went back to normal and Ethan stopped being in a snit. The Wiccan said spirits usually don't see each other. I told her Ethan is aware and gets annoyed when other spirits try to show up here because he has permission and they don't.

You might not believe me, but I swear on my eyes that everything I typed is the truth.

Anyone want to share their paranormal encounters with me?

[Eireann]

I used to babysit in a haunted house. I never did find out who haunted the place; the owners didn't believe in ghosts. I did find out that it used to be a farmhouse, and was built in 1915 (and for that area, most of which was settled decades later, 1915 meant that the house would have had quite a bit of land around it).

It was just weird. The house had a rather large front yard and not much of a back yard. During the day, things weren't too bad, but when the sun went down, especially given the fact that the house was set back from the street and had heavy greenery around it, the whole atmosphere was eerie. I always felt that someone or someTHING was looking at me through the windows. I would watch TV in the den, next to the kitchen; the couch faced away from the kitchen window, and I had the creepy feeling that I was being watched from the kitchen.

The kids never noticed anything, or if they did, they didn't mention it. Their room was upstairs, and I hated that part of the house. The attic was particularly bad. Once when the kids were playing in the attic, I stood in the doorway telling them to come out; I didn't want to go in there.

Putting the kids to bed. Oh, joy. I would put them to bed, shut the door, then walk down the wooden, uncarpeted stairs.

And I would hear heavy footsteps following me. Every time.

I would make it halfway down the stairs, then make a run for it - through the living room, the dining room, the kitchen, and into the den, where I would vault over the back of the couch and shiver for some time.

[Kittish]

I've been followed by the same tribe of what I call pixies for years (entirely with my blessing. I invited them to go with me the first time I moved after befriending them). They're small, and generally don't allow themselves to be seen. I'm sure everyone is familiar with the phenomenon of setting some small object down, moving or even just looking away for 5 or 10 seconds and having the object just vanish with no trace, then anywhere from a few minutes to a few days later reappear exactly where you remember setting it down. That is the work of pixies. They're a mischievous, playful bunch, and it isn't terribly hard to work out a deal with them. Give them fun, shiny toys, play with them, and be polite and mostly they'll actually start helping you find lost objects.

My experience over the past few years with the pixies has been that they can see and interact with spirits just fine... and they're picky about which ones they allow onto their turf. They seem to like cats (both living and spirit), but anything just passing through has tended to go around.

[Misanthropical]

We know that the spirit in our home is a man who died in the Civil War fighting on the side of the North. We know this because he partially appeared to my daughter. He mostly paces the hallway between my room and my daughter's room at night. He will either hang out in my room or my daughter's room if people are awake and moving around the house. He also likes to play over at Mr. Mis' desk after Mr. Mis goes to bed. We are the ones who gave him a name.

Objects are always moving around to different parts of the house or back where they were a few days later in my house. We always thought Ethan was just bored and thought it would be funny. It never occurred to us that that might have been the work of pixies.

My number one rule for spirits or anything else that comes through is they are not allowed to touch me or anyone else. Well, one night I was in my night gown and leaning over in the fridge when I felt a tug on my night gown. I whip around and no one is there. I figured it was Ethan thinking it would be funny since technically it wasn't actually touching me.

Maybe I should leave something shiny out in case it is pixies?

[Kittish]

Checking for pixies probably wouldn't be a bad idea. Some small, shiny trinket, even something as simple as a glittery hair clip, set down in an out of the way spot, with the announcement that it's a present for pixies is a good way to start off. From there, if something you're wanting is missing ask, out loud, if anyone knows where the item is, and if so, can they please bring it to you. Pixies are big on polite. Far as moving stuff around goes, as long as it's not causing any harm to anyone or anything, or causing you to lose important items (eyeglasses, wallets, purses, cell phones, mortgage paperwork, etc), play the game with em.

ETA: I never really thought about a 'don't touch me' sort of rule, but then, pretty much all of the spirits I've encountered were ones of beings that I had known in their life. With one exception, and he never touched any of us anyway. Native american man, have no idea how long ago he died, though I'd guess it was less than 200 years back, haunted the house that my exhusband's parents owned. We lived there with them for several months, and I got to know the ghost reasonably well. No one ever tried to give him a name, and he never told us his name. He appeared to me one time, middle of the night, when I happened to be still awake. Scared me stiff, but he didn't do anything but stand there for a minute, then vanish.

[firecat88]

I told my boys that it is like Grand Central Station for spirits here

Anyone want to share their paranormal encounters with me?

My house is kinda the same way, Mis. I've got spirits coming and going all the time. And I, being the only one sensitive enough to the activity, am the only one who's aware of just how much goes on around here. I've seen a shadowy figure of a woman walking across the living room, have had things walking around in my bedroom at night, been told off for being too loud by a spirit that was in my parents' bedroom. Said spirit was, in turn, told off by Marcus, my guardian angel who takes very little crap from anyone who isn't me, and other things. I blame the fact that, in my living room, there is an extremely large vortex in the middle of the floor.

Speaking of Marcus, though, he is one of the permanent metaphysical residents in my house:

~Marcus is my guardian. He looks like a Roman soldier, wields a sword, and he and I fight like an old married couple sometimes. I've only physically seen him once, in shadow form, when I was 6. Lately, though, I have "seen" what he actually looks like.

~Mamoru/Momo, a cat who followed me from my old house to the one I'm living in now. He likes to curl up on my bed at night, right next to my left leg.

~Kanna, an eagle who kinda treats me like her chick a lot of the time.

~Emily, a little girl who likes pink. I'm not sure what her story is, but a friend of mine was visiting the house a while ago and Emily kept poking her and tugging at her coat, under which she was wearing a shirt that was pink.

~My parents' guardians. I've never actually felt them personally, but the friend I mentioned before (I'll call her M) has seen them (she won't admit it, but she feels and sees things more strongly than I do). My dad's is a WWII-era soldier and my mom's is, I believe, a Yanomami woman.

Outside of my house, though, I've felt things as well.

When M was still living with her parents, I went over to her house a few years ago for her birthday party. I'd already known beforehand that her house is very paranormally active, but that was my first time actually being there. After the present-opening, she and I went up to her room to watch a movie. She left me alone for...maybe 5 minutes to go bring us some cake, and within 2 of those minutes, I got dizzy and randomly nervous like I should not be there. I spent the next 3 minutes praying that M would get back to the room already and trying to avoid looking at any reflective surfaces because I had a feeling I'd see something looking back at me that wasn't me. When she finally did get back to the room, I told her 'Don't ever leave me alone in your house for that long again.' and explained why.

Another place where I'm constantly feeling things is at school. One of the dorms is supposedly haunted, but I've never been in there so I can't vouch for that one. I *can*, though, name two of the buildings on campus that I know for sure are haunted- Houston Hall, which is the oldest building on campus, and Lowell Heiny Hall, which is where the financial aid office, the registrar's office, and several professors' offices are. In each building, the activity is centered around two places- The elevators in Houston, and the 4th floor and the stairwell in LH. I particularly hate the 4th floor of LH. There is something there that is...not right.

[dendawg]

My grandmother had what might be considered an encounter:

My dad was dying from cancer, and she had an angel hung on her wall. At about the same time he died, the angel fell from the wall.

I don't know if this was paranormal or not.

[Lady Legira]

We have a spirit we've nicknamed Bob, I can sense he's male. He generally quite quiet but does look after us when either one of us is alone in the house.

He's played tricks on (mostly) my sister. He stole her keys and put them on the inside of her pillowcase where her head sits and stole her phone but dropped it when my husband rang it, dropped from waist height out of thin air.

Mostly he just creaks doors and walks around to let me know he's about.

[MoonCat]

I had one really odd experience that I have never been able to understand.

It was years ago, I think I was in my 20's. Must have been a weekend because I was up really late one night, sitting in the kitchen listening to the radio and drawing. Off the kitchen was a bedroom which was technically my brother's but at the time he was living downstairs with our grandfather.

So about maybe 2 AM or so this horrible noise started up in that bedroom. It was this kind of shuddering, growling noise, like an engine or some kind of other machinery. Very, very loud. I froze. I was afraid to go look and just sat there. It's hard to explain how loud this was....you would have thought whatever was making it was right inside that room, as though somebody was revving up a tractor-trailer in there or something. It went on for several minutes & then just stopped. Finally I went to look because I knew the cat was sleeping on the bed & I was afraid for him, but he was still sound asleep.

Nobody else heard anything. My mom was in the living room several rooms away, watching TV. My sisters were asleep two rooms away, my brother & grandfather sleeping in the first floor flat. To this day I have not been able to figure out what the hell that was.

[CloserToSane]

There's nothing much at home. I'm sure there are two presences I guess in my room. They're very different and I've never been fond of either - one less so. But then again, they've never done anything so I don't think they're that bad.

The girls on my mother's side of the family have been known to come up with facts about deceased relatives that they've never met and they've completley accurate. Or we have "imaginary friends" who are named after the same relatives. It doesn't seem to last very long, but the youngest girl on my mother's side of the family seems to be very umm (might not be the right word) good at this and has been since she was a baby.

[Mytical]

Where do I begin? I've had quite a few actually. Only a couple in the houses I lived in however. I've walked through a spirit, or rather it through me once. Seen my uncles death, me miles away, at the time it happened..in a dream. I've lived a day twice, dreamed every minute of it the night before. I've sit and talked to a rocking chair (or rather the spirit that was rocking it), and seen a house with no less then 5 spirits (all friendly) in it.

[protege]

My grandmother's old house is haunted. I had some strange encounters in that place after my grandfather died. Keep in mind that he was a smartass, and enjoyed playing pranks on people. He also took care of his family. Since I was his first grandchild, and was at the house constantly, that might explain things.

Not long after he died, things got interesting. That is, I saw a ghost on the kitchen porch No face on it, but it was about Grandpa's height, and composed of a bluish mist. It wasn't on the porch long--it then appeared to move over towards the building that later housed my workshop. Maybe he was going to light the trash, like he usually did at night?

Inside, the house, always at night, I'd get the feeling that I was being watched, or that someone had put their hand on my shoulder. The "feeling watched" seemed to center around the area where his desk was. His desk, was originally in a room off the kitchen. Right in front of the desk, was a doorway, which originally led into the living room, but was blocked by a large couch. He could sit there, and watch the TV in the living room. Grandpa spent hours at his desk--paying bills, working on projects for the Lions Club, or doing his word search puzzles.

Anyway, if I was up late at night, I'd feel like someone was watching me from that room. Also, if I was sitting in his old recliner (which is now my recliner), I'd sometimes feel a hand on my shoulder. Since it never happened if I was on the couch, the other chair, or lying on the floor, I can only assume Grandpa was telling me to get out of his chair

It just sucks that none of that happens now. Grandma sold her house in 2007, and most of her things were divided up among relatives. Even though I ended up with the recliner, and many of my grandfather's things...nobody's touching me on the shoulder

I do know that my house does have a few resident spirits. The previous owner died of cancer in my office. So far, she's been pretty quiet. One who hasn't, was the white cat I had. Snow died of a heart attack in the kitchen. I've heard scratching noises in my office, and sometimes saw a white 'flash' running between the kitchen and living room. Also, I've come home, and found that the living room heating vents were closed--Snow *loved* to do that. Plus, she loved to curl up and take a nap in my office--the scratching noises were her claws attempting to 'knead' the carpet.

[bhskittykatt]

I've only had a couple experiences with one particular apparition. Well, I've had others, but they all ended up having known causations. This one though was weird.

Both times, I saw the girl in the same area while on my paper route. It's on a road that runs behind an elementary school. One house, I would pull up their driveway, deliver to their porch, then back into their neighbor's driveway and head on out (I was backing in a U-shape...these were two houses that shared a little drive).

One morning, I was backing up, and I was just using my rearview. As I came around the corner, I saw a girl standing behind my car. I slammed on the breaks and whipped around...but no one was there.

Even though I only saw her for a second, I can practically paint you a picture. Wavy, red hair that fell just below the shoulders. Skin so pale, it was almost white. She was wearing a blue dress with a white floral print, and a white, wide square collar. All about her was a sort of electric, light-blue aura. The weirdest part was she had no face, sort of like it was blurred out.

About a week later, I was delivering to another house on the same road, and I saw her, this time in the play field at the elementary school. I actually stopped my car and watched her for three or four seconds before she passed behind a tree and vanished. I haven't seen her since.

Oddly enough, I wasn't at all frightened at the time. It was eerie, and thinking back on it I get chills down my spine, but I felt strangely calm when it occurred.

I've seen shadow people, orbs, heard footsteps from people that weren't there, and in every other case, after a bit of research, I traced the phenomena to a known causation. This girl, though...I was wide awake, not on any sort of drug or medication...I just have no explanation for what I saw. I did not believe in the paranormal before that first morning. Now, my husband is a member of a TAPS family paranormal research group, and I've gone to some of the meetings, and I don't think it's crazy at all anymore.

[Misanthropical]

Mr. Mis told me that when I was in the hospital and he went to bed that Ethan would walk into the room and over to my side of the bed and stop liking he was looking for me and then leave the room, only to return and go to my side of the bed and stop like he was looking for me and that went on the whole time I was gone. It stopped when I got home and Ethan went back to his regular pacing.

When the big guy left to spend Christmas and New Years with his girlfriend in another state, we would hear Ethan in the boys room, which he rarely goes into and that continued till I told Ethan that the big guy was gone but that he would be back soon. We didn't hear him in there after that.

Ethan will voice his opinion even if he has to mimic another family members' voice. He used his own voice to tell the big guy off when the big guy was making a racket in his closet. He used the little guys' voice that only I heard (because he knew I would either go up there or send Mr. Mis up there) when the big guy was having a huge fight with his girlfriend on web cam and Ethan wanted it stopped.

My fathers' side of the family have all been sensitives as far back as we can trace. My children and I are all sensitives too, which attracts spirits to us.

When we first moved in 7 years ago, Ethan would purposely scare the bejesus out of my little guy, who really was a little guy at the time, so Ethan and I had a chat about the rules of my home and if he broke them I would banish him from my home and he shouldn't think I can not do it. I added the rule of not being in the bathrooms when people are in there. That one was added when I got out of the shower and my hair fell into my face. It was lifted and put behind my ear. I'm sorry, but I don't want anyone in there when I'm using it.

And, what is it with spirits and my hair? They either like to give a gentle yank on my ponytail or push it out of my face, this has happened no matter where I am at the time, so I'm just wondering.

[Racket_Man]

Mis,

besides you and your side of the family being sensative,I am wondering if your house has some sort of gateway inor near it?

my daughter used to have a "friend" or two. (not the imaginary kind). she used to play with "Amy". Amy like my DD's room (apt complex) but did occasionally come out into our living room and do some interesting things like move a straw around in a cup in response to questions (no windows open, ceiling fan funning,or HVAC running).

the other "person" was a grumpy old man who really did not talk or interact much with us.

It was fun to watch our cats (we had 3 at the time) watch something moving around the living room. they would occasionally get played with or picked up or petted. It never seemd to freak them out.

I myself am a bit sensative (possibly more than a little) but then after what Ex pulled (long story), I tried to close off/wall off that part of me. I still sometimes get "something" either bouncing around in the living room (little balls of light) or someone will move something in the back of my "office" to get my attention or "wack" me in the back of the head or arms causing a tinggling sensation.

my dog sometimes watches something unseen moving around the living room but I guess he is just so used to it now that it is under the catageory of "Whatever guys"

then they sometimes like to play with the VCR/DVD power button. and this is when no one is touching the remote.

for the most part they leave me alone. just even now and then they let me know they (whoever they are) are still around.

sometimes I get the feeling my deceased Aunt just comes around to say "HI". you can tell when she is around because of a very heavy perfume scent she leave behind.