Baby Card and The Wild Kingdom

Greetings!

After a lovely visit, my sister has left. I'm back in the Playhouse and my first priority was to make a new baby card for an attorney friend I used to work for. She and her husband just welcomed twins, Jack and Abigail! They join their two big brothers, so my friend has her hands full. I'm delighted she has a little girl now, too!!

I made a simple white-on-white CAS card, punctuated with a single shiny bow I happened to have in my stash that cornveniently has threads of both pink and blue!

The onesie die is from Papertrey Ink, the swiss dots embossing folder is Cuttlebug, the flat sequints are from my stash, and the ribbon is by Darice. That sit. I decided against a congratulations tag or banner, choosing to let the bow take center stage all by itself. The inside will have the sediment with lots of exclamation points for this blessed event!

Can I just say that w-o-w cards are terribly hard to photograph?! I know the one I'm showing is too busy against the flowers and the sun washed it out too much, but I took several photos inside against several different colored backgrounds (even black) and in the end, these outside shots were the least washed out. Maybe w-o-w cards are the one type of card where using a flash is best? I didn't try that option. Any advice is most welcome. Thank you!

I am entering my card in the current:

CASology challenge where the cue card word is "shine," which my ribbon certainly does!

Curtain Call Inspiration Challenge where the theme is "simple." Here is the inspiration photo:

Please make sure you click on the links for the details regarding rules, sponsors, and prizes. You will also find exceptional ideas and inspiration from the talented Design Teams for creating your own work of art to enter!

The Wild Kingdom

I have a few photos to share, including one of the raccoon I mentioned in my last post. Diana is a very good amateur photographer and photography is an interest we both share, as well as a love of trees, birds, and, basically all things nature. Even though I live in a suburban area, a lot of you know that we are fortunate to have a variety of hawks living nearby. Not to mention Hitler, the hummer. 

Well, during my sister's visit, all things ornithological were about and providing us with tons of entertainment and photographic opportunities. Hitler alone entertained her for hours on his swing and she got some amazing shots. I put my watermark on the photos to protect them, but all the photographs were taken by Diana, cept the ones of the two of us, of course.

Kites

Cooper's Hawk

Hitler

Yet another winged critter happened by.

We had lunch at a local winery where we each enjoyed a few glasses.

Just kidding, we each had a "flight" which consists of three little tastes amounting to one glass of wine. It's a fun way to try different wines.

We also enjoyed a Farmer's Market. These photos were also all taken by Diana.

Here we are taking a rest after the exercise we got eating the world's largest cinnamon roll. Each. I cropped the photo so just our faces were visible.

Diana and Darnell

My sister asked me why I cropped it. I showed her the full shot.

She looked at it and then looked at me aquizzically. I said, "For crying out loud, Diana," pointing to the screen, "I just wore an old bra and look, my breastesses are down around my elbows!" From seeing the photo now, I can see how my sister (older and smarter) wore her jacket just so in order to stimulate perky boobs. Clever.

The full photo reminds me of this image, shown here on a card I entered in the "Ugliest Card Ever" contest.

We weren't even trying to look like that. It just happens. Oh Vanity. Thank goodness it ceases to exist as you get older (at least in our family) and becomes just plain funny!

~~~

So. The raccoon. This all started about three weeks ago with footprints across the deck leading from one of the birdbaths. I showed them to the Mister and commented that the squirrel had been by. He cocked his head and looked at me aquizzically (I get that a lot) and noted that it must be a pretty big squirrel.

Turns out it wasn't a squirrel as a few nights later at dusk, a big ol' coon sauntered across the deck and went under it. Mister was after it in a flash with the garden hose, but didn't see where it went. A few minutes later I walked across the deck and into the house and as I walked I heard some scratching noises. Still walking, I glanced over my shoulder and there was the raccoon staring at me from the tree I had just walked under! GASP!

For a couple of weeks we were trying to coexist with the darn thing. After dark, I began traver singing between the house and the Playhouse armed with a large flashlight and an umbrella. Then things turned ugly when it started using our backyard as it's bathroom. That is not cute!

We blocked any access to under the deck and emptied the birdbaths and that seemed to help. Then one evening while Diana was here, we were sitting in the deck chairs and suddenly the Cooper's Hawk started screeching to beat the band. Diana grabbed her camera and we dashed out front. Several of the neighbors were out there exclaiming that the coon had gone up our maple tree and the hawk wasn't the least bit happy about it. When the raccoon came down, Diana was able to get a photo when it climbed on top of the fence.

So that was our excitement during her visit. (It doesn't take much to get us becited!!) Any advice on getting rid of a raccoon would be appreciated. We have no pets and the garbage cans are impenetrable. Oh, wait, you'll love this. One of the helpful hints Mister found online was that coons don't like mothballs, so he liberally placed mothballs in the two potty places. The next morning we got up and the dirty rac had pooped right on TOP of the mothballs! I took a picture, but since you're having a snack, I won't share it.

I'll leave you with this timely cartoon I just saw on Facebook.

Thank you if you stuck it out through this post! Here is a reminder that I DID make a card!

~~~

Enjoy your day! No, seriously, enjoy.  LITS!* 

As always, thank you for coming by to visit the Playhouse and special thanks to you if you take the time to leave a comment and/or join as a follower! Please let me know you came by, so I can be sure and return the flavor! 

  

 

*Life Is Too Short!

To open the pop-up comment box that let's you jump to the end w/o scrolling:

Click CTL + Home.
Click the Home tab under my blog banner which resets the post.
Click Page Down to reach the end of the post.
Click Comments and the pop-up box opens.
Click Jump to Comment Form; no more car pool tunnel!
Mwah!

Mojo Monday #291 ~ Dream

A Sunny Hello!

 

And we're back around to Friday ~ whoosh!

 

I have missed Days 3 and 4 of my online card class, so I've got some catching up to do in class time and in homework.  Oopers.  I spent the entire day yesterday cleaning up the Playhouse, which means I'm also behind in my visits to you.

 

A lot of you know that I love polka dots and plaids and stripes.  You may have noticed that I like my ribbons bespectacled in this way, too.  I've purchased dotty ribbons from SU! and PTI and striped ribbons from SU!  The truth is, however, that until they ended up together on my desk a couple of weeks ago for some forgotten purpose, I had never noticed how striking the stripey SU! ribbons were together. 

 

 

I was really taken with them and I wanted to make a card with them.  I HAD to make a card with them, but they weren't dressed for the various events on my calendar.  So they waited.  While they waited, I kept stacking them in different color order, fondling them when I was on the phone.  I wished I had a straw hat so I could make happy ribbon hatbands for it.

 

And then along came yesterday.  Yesterday I was a Hoover with a Master's Degree in Organization and Efficiency, deployed in Operation Clean Sweep.  If they were going on a card together, it was now or maybe never.  From behind my apron strings, peeked little Miss Nida Challenge. 

 

She's a persistent little thing, so I searched my Challenges tab to see what was on tap and lookie here what I found!  An absolutely perfect sketch at Mojo Monday.

 

As you can see, it is "Round or Square" week and the sketch, seemingly made just for me, is by the talented Julee Tilman.

 

I haven't played at Mojo Monday for a while and I'm delighted to do so again.  I'm pretty sure that Mojo was the very first sketch challenge that I played in and I did so often.  It's a popular challenge and the sketches are usually more layered than I prefer, but I have never felt unwelcome with my CAS cards.  Check them out if you haven't already!

 

Here is my card.

 

 

This will make a cheery graduation card for my niece who is getting her real  Master's and going on to medical school.  It was actually pretty QACAS, so I went to see if my colors would fit for the current 10-Minute Craft Dash, but not.  (Hey, if that had happened, I would have had to wash my face and put on shoes and go buy a lottery ticket!)

 

~~~

 

My ribbons are now happily back with their color families and I can resume my classes and visits and shopping.  Wait.  How did that get in there?  And why do you need a resume to take an online class?

 

~~~

 

I'm pickled tink to announce that we have Julie Juhl joining our journey!  Julie, I can't find your website if you have one.  If you do, please email and let me know, so that I can share your site with everyone!  Thank you for following!

 

~~~

 

Member the Cooper's Hawks I told you about that were perching often in our neighbor's tree?  This is a photo of one of them:

 

 

Well, well, well.  They have moved over to OUR large maple.  This is the result:

 

 

Nature giveth and giveth!  And spit happens.

 

~~~

 

Enjoy your day!  No, seriously, enjoy your day.  LITS*!

Thank you so much for stopping by the Playhouse. Special thanks to you if you take the time to leave a comment or join as a follower!

 

*Life Is Too Short!

 

Paper:  PTI vintage cream; SU! melon mambo,

  wild wasabi

Stamp:  PTI (I think) from a "Dream Big" stamp

Ink:  SU! not quite navy

Ribbon:  SU! melon mambo, wild wasabi, and

  not quite navy; cheapo skinny organza

Pop Dots