Baby, Baby, Baby

Three baby cards for three different baby showers, all for the same mom to be.  I made these for the grandma who will be attending each event.  They’re all digital images colored with Copic markers.  I used similar colors on each card, but different designer papers.  The sentiments were selected from among my stamps.

The first is an image from Designed2Delight.  It’s called April Showers.  It’s not necessarily a baby stamp, but I thought it would be cute for a shower card.  I added the raindrops with a stamp.



The second image comes from Sassy Cheryl’s.  This one is called Rubadubdub.



And last we have Baby Line from Just Inklined.



These were fun and I hope you enjoyed looking.  Have a happy day!

Just Because They’re So Darn Cute

Yes, the babies know I like to take their pictures, and they’re very obliging.  Wally looks like he’s submitting painfully, doesn’t he?  Actually, that’s his “I’m trying to be a good boy while the kid fools around” look.



Okay, now that she’s out of the way I’ll pose for you.



You want me to sit and smile?  Okay!



How about down here?  You want me down here?  Just tell me.. I’ll do anything you say.



LuLu decided she’d rather pose on the stairs.





Or maybe in the flowers.  She’s such a girl!



Hope their smiles make you smile.  Love!

A Tribute to Mom

Today being Mother’s Day, I think it’s high time my own mom got a little recognition.  She lived a quiet and selfless life and endured much hardship – oh, I could go on about the hardship, but I won’t.  It was enough to produce a broken and sad woman, but Mom had a different way of dealing with all that – her children, her art, her love of all things alive and growing.  She passed away some years ago, but her essence lives in me.  I don’t think a person realizes how possible that is until they’ve cast off all the layers Life piles on and gotten down to the nitty gritty of who they really are, and in my case – yup, there’s Mom.  Hi, Mom!  Glad to have you with me today!

It was such a beautiful day I thought I’d take Mom out to the garden to photograph her.  She’d like that.  She always had a beautiful garden and loved color.  Can you tell by looking at the photograph?  She sewed her smock and crocheted the afghan behind her.   She’s pictured with a ball of yarn in one hand and her sweet Collie, Lady, in the other.  This is how I grew up – gardens, color, art, and a sublime affection for large, fluffy dogs.



Mom was a true artist.  She had a gift.  The photo below is one of Mom’s paintings – acrylics on myrtlewood.  Her work was quite in demand and sold all over the world.  She supplied artwork to several myrtlewood shops in the area and was paid a pittance.  The money wasn’t as important to her as the art.



I could never aspire to this, but she’s always been my inspiration.



I wish she were here so I could thank her for giving me everything I value most highly.  You did a good job, Mom.  It took 58 years, but I think I might finally be on the right track.




Happy Mother’s Day!

This is How We Empty the Pool

Everyone in position…



Focus…



Jump into the water!



Again.



And again.



And again.









Wally waits patiently while LuLu gets a little trickle.  Mostly she loves to watch.  I think she’s a little in awe of Wally, her magnificent hero.



And that’s how we empty the pool.  Happy Saturday!

Goodwill Gardening

Until LuLu learns not to romp through the flower beds I’ll be using containers for my more delicate plantings.  Most of my pots are already full, but I’ll need more – much more if I’m to have all the color I hope for in the garden.  I can spend a lot of money on decorative pots or I can go to Goodwill and see what they have I might improvise with.  I popped in there today and found these in about two minutes and for a fraction of what I might ordinarily spend.  I like the shape of the blue pot.  It has a small mouth, but plenty of room for roots to spread, and there’s a drainage hole in the bottom.  The basket is lined with cloth, and I could fill it with dirt as is, or insert a plain plastic pot as shown.  Once they have flowers spilling over their rims I think they’ll look quite nice.



These are wallflowers in one of my large pots on the deck.



These are the tiny blue flowers of a Jack Frost Brunnera macrophylla with pretty white allium bells.



I hope to get my new pots planted over the weekend.  Later I’ll share what they look like when the plants are mature.  Have a beautiful day!

Welcoming A New Arrival

Our neighbors across the street just had a baby girl and I wanted to welcome her to the neighborhood with a little gift and a hand stamped card.  The dog was already stamped and just needed some color.  It’s all about keeping it simple, seeing as how the sun finally came out and the garden is calling my name.



I used Popcorn the Bear Bundle of Joy stamp set, watercolored on 90 lb. hot press watercolor paper.

Thank you for your time, and have a lovely day!

Scotch Broom in Bloom

Scotch broom grows in wild abundance here, so pretty against a crystal blue sky.  When you’re reclining on a mossy slope in the sunshine it’s even easier to appreciate its beauty.  Simple pleasures are the best.

Puppies in the Pines

What the pines, in this case, amount to is a big brush pile in a local state park.  It will be hauled away later, but this weekend it was a fun place for the puppies to explore after a swim in the lake.



I couldn’t have chosen a more coordinated setting for this close up of Wally. 



LuLu with her softer coloring looks pretty, too.  She’s shaping up into a fine young lady.



How about an action photo.  We call this Wally’s tyrannosaurus pose.



One more of the precious pair.



It was a beautiful weekend.  Could have been warmer, but I remind myself it’s May on the Oregon coast.  I was just happy it was dry!  Have a good week!

Daddy’s Little Helpers

It was a recent rare sunny day.  Rich went out to trim the ferns and, of course, he had plenty of help, if only in the way of companionship.  Wally and LuLu were being very sweet and quiet.  Just clip, clip, clip, and the rustle of fern fronds.











You can tell by how wet they are that they’d already been playing in the pool.  It must have taken some of the mischief out of them.  I can hardly wait for the rain to stop and the temps to warm.  We’ve had a very wet spring.  I hope it’s beautiful where you are.  Enjoy your day!

It Seems There is No Perfect World

Apparently I can’t reply to your comments unless you have a Blogger profile with your email address enabled.  I Googled and found a lot of into about that.  You can read about it here, for instance.  And what if you have no Blogger profile?  Well, then I can’t reply at all, unless I do a public reply in the form of a comment on the blog post.  Poo!  Who really checks there for an answer to their question?  How can I tell you how glad I was to hear from you?  This, in my opinion, is a HUGE Blogger flaw!

What about all my email subscribers who like to send me a response in an email by clicking “reply”?  I have now enabled my email address in my profile.  Will I still be noreply@blogger.com?  It’s all very frustrating, and that was certainly not in the plans when I made this move.

I’ve been asked why I moved to a new blog at all.  Well, a fresh start, for one thing.  A new name, new direction.  Design flexibility.  Free, as opposed to $14.95 per month.

I’ll be working on solutions.

Thank you so much for your patience and for all of you wonderful friends who have already made the move with me.  Welcome to every new reader who stops by.  We’ll get through this.  Somehow.