Weekend Eyepleasers

Pen, cob, and cygnets - a swan family.

Male housefinch.  

I wish I had had my camera with me upstairs later in the day.  This male was high in the top of an evergreen with 4 females trying to get his attention.  They were surrounding him two at a time and fluttering their wings against his body.  What a spectacle!  I've read that the females try to go after the males that have the brightes plumage.  Guess this guy was considered pretty hot!

It was very windy on the way home and the clouds looked like they were rolling waves.  By the time we pulled over and I got out the camera, all that was left were these gray ones which if you use your imagination you might be able to see a pod of dolphins.  

These next three pictures are the three varieties of peonies we have in the yard.  Don't ask me the names though.  Can you tell I like the pink ones?  You can see in the second picture that the are in a cage - most of our plantings are in cages or fenced in because we have such a deer problem.    Not very charming but necessary.

Creatively, I've been working on some zentangles but nothing ready to share yet.  I gessoed some more papier mache items in preparation for tangling them in the future.   

It was a lovely weekend that started with a tea sponsored by the Barnegat Historical Society.  (I'll be posting pictures of that separately.)  Catching up with friends out to dinner was a lot of fun.  Hearing stories of our "youthful" days - some of them never heard before - made it a memorable evening.  The weather was beautiful but just a bit too windy for biking.

  Hope you had an enjoyable weekend too.

Anniversary & Flea Finds

Last weekend friends of ours celebrated their 35th wedding anniversary and since that anniversary is the coral or jade anniversary here is the card that I made for them.

I stamped the image in Crumb Cake and used my markers and a blender pen to color the corals and the shells.  The hint of blue for water was swished on with my aquapainter and two shades of blue ink.  I hope they enjoyed their very special anniversary.

On Saturday, HWNSNBP and I stopped at a little flea market being held at a local nursing home.  

I don't know exactly why, but I couldn't pass up this old metal roll dispenser.  I don't know if it was the subtle pink color or the fact that it was only 25 cents.  (Of course, HWNSNBP just shook his head !)

There's room for - and it's also in raised letters - wax paper, aluminum foil, and paper towels.  I need to think about whether I will refinish this or just clean it up and add to it, but it will go in the stamp castle to hold those exact things it is meant to hold and can be used for my crafting.

These pieces of jewelry were only a quarter for the pair of earrings and a quarter for the wood circle pin.  I photographed them with a quarter to get a size reference.  I will not be wearing the earrings.  I thought that they would make a great card embellishment (probably another color though), and the pin has possibilities.

But for 75 cents and a nice stroll in the warm sun it was a fruitful stop.

JB12:10b - Embossing Again

So............. for this card I embossed two ways.  I used an embossing folder for the snowflake panel and the punched tag was from the leftover cut out circle from the first card.  The little birdies in the snow image is a Picture Show Stamp (http://www.etsy.com/shop/pictureshow) that I first inked with VersaMark and then with Night of Navy ink and then clear embossed.  I then, very carefully, colored the birds with my aquapainter and inks.  I stuck that modern label punch behind it and added the navy bow.  The snowflake was an MS punch that I added a half pearl to.  I wanted something short to center at the bottom under the image and used the word PEACE.  Hmmmmmm, wish I had that stamp in just a tad bigger font!

Looking at this picture, the card does appear a little boring, but IRL the navy and white really pop.  I think it could be my picture taking skills were not up to par as I had only 12 minutes to photograph, edit, and post this post.  My fault totally - I had everything laid out last night and should only have had to put finishing touches on it.  This wasn't procrastination this time - just distraction.  I come home with a plan and in no time the plan is shot to ..........  

It's been a while since I visited that Etsy store and I'm seeing a few more things I think I'll have to indulge in! But I will have to put that off until later because the weeds are calling to me.  I'm only waiting until HWNSNBP is far enough away with the lawnmower from the area that I want to weed tonight.  It has rained over the past couple of days and the grass is begging to be cut and the weeds are trying to take over all the flower beds!

JB12:10a - Embossing Around the Christmas Tree

When I was trying to pick out a stamp to use this week for this challenge I was happy to find this one in my stash not having used it before.  It just had to be a bluebird.  Right?  I intended to post this last night as it was raining and I was finished with it early enough, however, if you've read my previous post, you'll know that I was a bit distressed and thought I'd better leave it for today.  

So as the title implies, we were to use some form of embossing on our cards for this challenge.  Whether it be dry or heat embossing - didn't matter, just as long as something, some part, was embossed.

The white panel is embossed and I used a circle punch to make an opening so I could fit the stamped image inside of it while using the card base as a frame for it.  The sentiment was stamped on a scrap of vellum and is glued onto the embossed panel just under the snowflakes.  IRL you can see the embossing through the vellum still giving some texture to it.

The image was stamped onto watercolor paper and I used my aquapainter and inks to color it.  You really can't see that the snowbank was painted with glimmer pearl and I took a glitter gel pen to give some sparkle to the ice.  Last step was to add the snowflakes and half pearls.  

Okay, gonna see if I can get another card done for this challenge using a different embossing technique.  But, should you want to see what the lovely Jingle Belles have done so far, click here.  

No Pictures

I watched her the last couple of evenings.  How brave she was sitting there.  The darkness to her was even more so because she was inside at night.  Alone except for the five promises of new life she now gave her full attention.  Alone, with one visitor only in the daylight.  Come to relieve her watch.  Let her stretch her wings.  Bring her tasty morsels.  But at night it was up to her. Keep them warm.  Keep them safe.  She shifted position carefully.  She tapped the bottom with her beak and turned the eggs every now and then.  She knew her job.  She didn’t know her fate.

It was time to turn the camera off.  We heard a noise.  It should not be.  It was more than the rain on the box.  Something trying to get in.  Was it her mate?  No.  It had an arm. It came in quickly.  It swiped back and forth.  Something’s trying to take her I screamed.  There was movement.  Both the bird and the arm.  Then she was gone.  The arm came back and swiped back and forth again and again but all it got was the grass from the nest.  The eggs were too far down to reach.  But she was gone.

He ran outside with a flashlight into the pouring rain.  He looked but did not see her.  He did not see the owner of the arm either.  Did it have her?  Did she fly away?  The nest is a mess but the eggs are safe.  But it’s raining, and it’s nighttime, and it’s only mid-May.  Not warm enough to be unattended.  Not after four days of patient incubation.

 

If she’s not dead, will she come back?  We don’t know.  We don’t know. 

Having the camera in the box was a joy that suddenly became so painful.  We wanted to be witness to nature but not this way. 

We are so sad.

Happy Mother's Day

Teacher Appreciation Day 2012

Just a little something I saw here on Pinterest that I wanted to do for Teacher Appreciation Day.  

I covered a wooden frame that I found at Mike's with some DSP.  The saying was generated from my printer and some sticks from the yard.  The finishing touch was the addition of the butterflies.

This will be for the teacher in the family, however, today it will be displayed in the office at school along with a bowl of three different kinds of pretzel sticks to honor our staff on Teacher Appreciation Day.