Little Duckie Update

Well sad news to report...Little Kiki passed away this morning. We tried nursing her but there's only so much you can do when a critter won't eat..Its sad, but it's no one's fault. She was just very weak from the start. We made her comfortable and gave her TLC and thats all any duckie in her situation could ask for, so I'm trying not to torment myself about it.
We have four healthy, hyper little babies doing just fine and I am grateful that I have the privilege of looking after them.

Welcome Babies!

Well guess who arrived today in the post? lol It just so happened that we have a friend who works in the post office so I called him a couple of days ago to give him a heads up about the parcel, and could he please call us as soon as he spots the peeping box. He said sure, but the mail arrives at 3 in the morning, just how soon do we want him to call? I said that the duckies would have to sleep til 7.lol.
Anyway, we got them home and into the bathtub and they immediately started running around like they were lunatics!! All except Kiki, the little fawn and white runner who was so listless and floppy we didnt think she'd make it.
So we wrapped her in a towel with a heatpak (like hunters use in their shoes)and she's already perking up. They get a little taumatized in the two day journey with temperature changes etc. Ideally, baby ducks and chicks should be kept at 90 degrees for the first week or so. Impossible in transit, and they ship them the day that they hatch. So these babies are two days old. The black one is Gollywog, the brown one Penny. The grey one is Ping (to replace my original)and the little sickly one is Kiki. The remaining buff one (she's yellow right now) is Lulu. ;-) Thanks for looking.

Snakes And Icecream Sandwiches

My friend Stacey absolutely HATES snakes and is scared to death of them so I hope she doesn't check out my blog today! LOL I was talking on the phone to my sister this morning and I glanced out the window and saw this rat snake by the porch. (Its ok, don't freak, they're not venomous!)He was about three feet long and rather ....slithery...ok, how else do you describe a snake? LOL You gotta check out his tongue in that first picture...

Something else interesting happened to me today to cheer me. I went grocery shopping and as I was putting my bags in the truck, my daughter and I were approached by an elderly man with icecream on his face holding out a bag to me. He explained that he had bought a box of icecream sandwiches and thought there were only six of them in there but after eating seven, realized that it was actually a pack of ten! LOL He wondered if we might want to finish them as they would melt before he got home. Now, in that situation would YOU eat the icecream sandwiches? He looked harmless enough. Somehow I couldn't picture this man syringing poison into the icecream so.......don't think me desperate, but it was hot...
We ate them.

My Grown Ducks

Yes, can you believe how big they've gotten? All grown up now...boo hoo. No, its nice to see them enjoying themselves as only bigger ducks can; swimming freely and foraging etc . Yesterday I spent a couple hours in the afternoon waist-deep in the pond clearing duckweed. It was rather backbreaking but I did clear quite a large section for the ducks to swim in. You can see the large pile of weeds there in the last picture. (that's one of TWO piles). They were getting hemmed in by it and its so strong I was afraid they'd get tangled. Tomorrow I will try to clear some more. (If my back is up to it. LOL

A Duck Pressie

As you know from my last post, I have lost my favorite duck, a blue Indian runner named Ping. Well, I was (am) pretty miserable about it so my husband has decided to give me my anniversary present early. Can you guess?
New ducklings! I ordered them today and they will arrive next Thursday. We have five coming (they need company. :-) A black Runner, A blue runner, a chocolate runner and a fawn/white runner. Also there's a buff-colored "normal" duckling "thown in" cos there's a minimum shipping charge and it is a VERY sweet duck!! So I have something to look forward to now. I thought my surrogate duck mummy business was over but it is to begin again! I will be sure to take pics and post them. It has cheered me up some and soothed the aching just a bit.
I hope that whatever it was that ate my duck for lunch was very hungry or needed food for babies. Otherwise, I hope it choked! Bye for now.

Mojo Monday 2

I was making a card for Mojo Monday's sketch challenge and came up with two. I dont know if they will allow two entries but I will try and if not it doesn't really matter as I will find someone to give it to anyway to.. I used papers from K&Co (Amy Butler) and my MS paper punch. Thats about it. Thanks for looking.
I am a bit mopey today. Dang it, I'm really SAD!! IN fact, I can't stop bawling. My little Ping is gone and I know he's "only a duck" but he was my favorite duck (a charcoal Indian Runner) and the runt. I raised all four of them from only a couple days old in my bathtub. And now they are nearly full grown and stay outside and have full run of the pond.
The worst of it is, I don't know what happened. He's just gone. There's no dog pawprints near the water. Nothing. It could have been a bird of prey or maybe a Cottonmouth or a really big snapping turtle....I don't know...and it really bothers me. We got the kayak out and searched the pond and looked under bushes etc but no sign of him.
At one point I thought I saw him. I saw a dark duck happily playing in the pond quite a ways off and thought just MAYBE he got adventurous! But then this duck (merely a visitor) flew off. (something that Ping can't do yet as his feathers aren't fully grown.
I'll get over it eventually...but today I'm sad.

Tree Frog

My daughter discovered this little tree frog out exploring in the yard the other day. I have to say he's a very sweet little amphibian! :-) Look at those fingers! He should learn the piano!

Clear Stamp Storage

I did not come up with this idea. I found it blog-hopping one day when I was looking for a storage solution for my clear and unmounted stamps. I swear, once you've tried it you'll be desecrating all your CD cases. LOL. Not me, though. I'm asking around my friends!
ANyway, the one thing you must get right is this: Dont buy CDROM cases thinking they're the same thing as CD cases. They're not. They're thinner and they dont have a removable disc inset. And you need that cos you need to be able to remove that part.
Keep your acetate picture of your stamps and lay it on the inside of your CD case. Then you'll know where your stamps go when you return them and you'll see what you've got much quicker.
Thanks for looking. Hope this helps someone else. :-)

Still Talking Storage

These are some assorted cans that I covered with pretty paper and lined with cork to store my pencils in. I love them cos they're personal. I had hunted around trying to find the "perfect pencil cups" and they didn't exist! So I made them myself and they really are perfect for what I need. :-)
Some were macaroon containers or cocoa powder containers or even baking powder cans. You can use anything. I adhere the paper (in these cases K&Co or DCWV) with Scortape, a wonderfully strong product that you can just rip with your fingers, no need for scissors. Oilla.

Storage Idea for Spellbinder's Nestabilities

Hi!
Everyone needs storage. And if they're crafty they need lots of storage! :-) I am passing along a tip I have borrowed from others and found it works really well.
 Spellbinders Nestabilities. Aren't they great? When I first started buying them I kept them in their original packs, but found that the packaging scratched my fingers everytime I wanted to slide the dies out. Then I put them in CD cases but found that the sticky tape loses its stickiness and the dies all fall out as you open the case. What to do?
 I saw some really neat magnetic binders online but wanted something more immediate.
 Result: Clasp rings.
You can find them in the embroidery section of the large craft stores like Michaels. (apparently people use them to organize embroidery floss squares.) They cost about a buck apiece and I use one ring for two nestability sets. You could fit loads more on a ring but its easier finding what you want if you don't overload them, right? Here's a closer look:

I hope this comes in useful for someone out there.It definately works for me!

I have no idea what this shelf thingamajig was originally used for but I saw it in an antique shop and decided it was perfect for my Distress Inks. You can probably fit about 30 inkpads on it comfortably. Pretty Cool find! They had old matchbox cars sitting on it (rather awkwardly, if Im being honest, as the shelves slant downwards) I got it for 10 bucks which I think is pretty decent. :-)

Quilted Bags

A FEW bags that I made when I went through a quilting faze a few years ago......

Diaper Cakes

The most fun cakes of all to make!

Diaper Cakes!!!

Purse Box Tutorial in "Inches"

Since I made the purse gift box a while back I have had several requests for the pattern.

Well the pattern isn't mine, I learned from Randi, and if you understand metric you could do no better than follow Randi's wonderful instructions here.

However, if you're like me, you're an "inches" girl. So of course it was only a matter of time before I "improvised" and created a pattern which looks very much like Randi's only I use inches. In actual fact, the box comes out about an inch larger than Rand's original, but it seemed the only way to do it and still make the measurements reasonable to us "inchies".

OK!

So start off with a sheet of cardstock 8x12 inches .

With your paper "landscape" across your scorpal, score the sheet into three columns, (so score at 4 inches and  8 inches.)

Now, turn the paper "portrait" and score down the sides at 1 1/4 inches on either side. So that when you turn the paper back to it's "landscape" position it would look like this below:

OK?

Now look at the picture below. 

You're going to make a mark at 2 3/4 inches down the inner line.

Do this on both sides and at both ends.

Now, using a ruler,  draw a line from those dots to the outer edges of the paper like so:

So, see you have these two squares now, right?

Now you want to draw a line from the middle of that square to the vertice there inside, see what I mean in the picture below:

(If you want to be exact, measure 7/8 inch to get to the middle of that line, but this really isn't critical, so I just eyeball it.)

See the triangles you now have?

Now we're going to cut across the line you see below and snip out that inner triangle.

It will look like this:

Do the same for both ends of the paper. (See below).

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OK!

Now we're going to do the gables.

Hold your paper "portrait".

If you look close you can see the measurements I've written on the paper below. You will measure 2 inches in from the score line on the left and also 2 inches in from the score line on the right. Make two dots.

Now,  draw a line from these two dots to the two corners of the triangles that you just snipped out, ok?

It will look like the gable of a house.

Then we snip out the bits that aren't in the "gable". See below.

Are you following me?

We need to repeat for the other end of the paper, so it matches.

Cut out.

Now rub over your score lines to make them all crisp.

Your box will begin to take shape.

Now score tape (or use whatever strong adhesive you like) the corners and affix.

It will look like a house without a roof.

Now we need to measure out two strips of cardstock. The first is:

11 x 4 inches.

Holding it "landscape", score  the first "panel"  at 1 1/4  inches wide, the next panel at 3 1/2 inches, 

then 1 1/2 inches, 3 1/2 inches and the last panel should be 1 1/4 inches wide.

The skinnier panel underneath is the "bridge"  and that measures 1 1/2 x 8. You will score 2 inches in at both ends.

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So here are the pieces below:

The narrow panel lays across the top and inside of the "house like a rafter. Scortape that in. Just match your score lines to the flat edge of the roof.

Now check that when you lay your wide panel on top of the "rafter"  that the measurements all look accurate.

You will also cut a piece of cardstock 11x 1 for the purse handle.

Now decorate the panels.

For the sides of the purse, simply turn your purse on its side and trace the pattern onto a sheet of designer paper and  then cut the shapes out. Trim to have a bit of a border or mat.

I am using Coredinations cardstock for the matting and DCWV glittery decorative paper everything else.You can see the finished panels below:

Now we need to make a hole on either side of the purse so you can reach in. I am using my Spellbinders Nestabilities for this.

And because I want a bit of a frame for my circles I am using a scalloped nestie on the dark pink cardstock.

First cut out the scalloped circle below (using the cuttlebug)

And then lay the solid circle on top of the cut out scalloped circle and cut again, leaving you with two scalloped rings.

Paste onto the panel.

Once you've affixed the long panel at the "roof", you can either tape down the sides of the panel at the bases or use small magnet closures so that you can lift up the sides when you want to.

Fully assembled below:

And for those of you who say, "I don't know what I would use something like this for!" 

Uh hello????

OK, I hope this works out for you. If you have any questions or I'm just not being clear or I forgot to mention a measurement, please tell me so I can fix it or elaborate. :-)