Waiting

Hello friends!  We have been very busy around here which is the reason I have been missing from my blog for the last few days. For the most part it has been  fun busy.

We had a wedding last weekend and our son stayed with us for the weekend too. We were invited over for dinner on Sunday and just had friends over for dinner last night. Doing lots of  yard work and trying to keep up with the house work and getting ready for our much anticipated camping trip.
It is a dreary day out so far today and I just don't feel like doing much of anything so I decided to relax a bit and post my photo for Our Beautiful World which I have been meaning to do since Sunday.

The prompt for this week over at Our Beautiful World is
You are to find a photo that represents waiting to you and share the story behind the photo. It has really been fun playing along at Our Beautiful World and everyone is so friendly over there.

I went to water one of my hanging plants earlier this summer and to my surprise this is what I found in it:

 A little Oregon Junco made it's nest in the hanging plant. If you click on the photo you might be able to see  that she lined the nest with the white hair from our dog. Nothing goes wasted in nature. There were three small eggs in the nest. The first egg she laid is actually under the dog hair.

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 Every time I would walk by the planter I would check on the eggs. Most of the time mom  Junco would be sitting on them. Finally I found one teeny tiny chick with just fuzz on it's head and then it was joined by another one. I thought the third egg didn't hatch but when they were older I finally saw the third one. It was a very  full nest.

A you can see from this photo the nest is now empty and I now longer have to wait until mom has left the nest to find food for her brood before I  can water the plant. I had to be careful when watering so I didn't get the eggs wet or drown the babies after they hatched. I always waited until the plants were droopy before watering because I hated to disturb the family. We enjoyed watching the little ones grow and mom and dad flying to and from the nest bringing insects for the hungry babies.

 

I do miss them but I occasionally see the three babies in my garden looking for food and mom and dad Junco are still nearby and cause a ruckus if I get too close to their babies.

Thanks for dropping by!

Teresa

Details..

...is what it's all about over at Our Beautiful World. 
 I have a few photos from my flower gardens that I thought of when I read what Week 4 was about and have really been meaning to post them just never got around to it until now.
So here you go and I hope you enjoy!

(Click on each photo for a larger view)

These are my lovely lilies.

  I have several different kinds and colors.

 But I want more!

  I see so many pretty ones around our area when I take the dog for his walks each evening.

 Sadly my happy daisy's are finished blooming too.

 These are my phlox's which I have had for only two years. They are really doing well now and multiplying which makes me happy.

 These are my Star Gazer lilies that were given to my several years ago by a dear friend. I even moved them from our old house to this one.

 

 These are right by our front door and they fill our whole front yard with their amazing sweet scent.

This bud is fat and getting ready to soon burst forth and release it's beauty and sweet scent.

I love how the light pink lilies have dark spots closer to the center. So pretty!

These last few photos are my hydrangea in the different stages of blooming.

 This bush is right by my Star Gazer Lilies.

 Almost there.

 In full bloom!

 For those who are visiting from Our Beautiful World my camera is a Panasonic point and shoot

with a Lumix lens. Nothing fancy but I love it because it takes great macro photos and is so easy to use.

Thanks for stopping by!

Teresa

Hi There!

Hello! I have another card to share with you all. 

First up is my card:

It all came together pretty well except for the ribbon and leaves I had an issue with but figured it after a bit of trial and error.

I used the ColourQ #199 for the color inspiration. I tried my best to match the colors with what I had so I hope I am close enough to their colors. I love the photo where the colors came from.

 I used the sketch from Viva La Verve July Week 4 Sketch  Challenge

 I love how unique the sketch is and was so fun to work with.

I'll start with the card base. I used a Tim Holtz Sizzix scalloped die on the right edge then embossed it with a Tim Holtz Alteration embossing folder. I then inked the embossed card base  with Spun Sugar Distress ink and the edges with Worn Lipstick. Next layer is kraft cardstock that I stamped with Hero Arts Envelope background stamp with Versamark Watermark ink and used clear embossing powder. I also distressed inked the edges with Worn Lipstick. I picked a pattern green cardstock for the next layer, rounded the corners and distressed the edges.

The next layer is the banner that is kraft cardstock and stamped in Versamark Watermark ink and embossed with white ink.

 The shape is a die from Papertrey Ink cut from vellum and embossed with Swiss Dot embossing folder and the edges inked with Worn Lipstick. The pale pink paper flowers are inked with Worn Lipstick and the leaves are stamped with Peeled Paint. It took me three tries to get the right size of leaves. I felt like Goldilocks. First set was too big. Then next set were too small. Finally I got it right the third time. :)

I then added the strip of pearls down the left side of the kraft paper. And then I had an issue with the bow. First bow was a dark pink wide grosgrain ribbon and I just didn't like it so I went with a thinner ribbon of the same color. Nope, that didn't work either. Then finally I thought of just using jute twine Ahhh, that was perfect and I was done.

Thanks So Much

 Hello! Here it is the beginning of another week. Boy, July is just flying by and so is summer.
Today I have something a little different. I'll start by showing my card:

 

 Here is the sketch I used:       

I don't remember how I ran across Sketchbook Saturday Challenge but I always love finding new sketch challenge to try.

Now here is where things are a little different. Friday I bought a new stamp set from My Favorite Things. When I opened the packaging I thought it was too pretty to throw it away.

Here it is: ( I had already cut it apart)

I cut off the decorative ends and then cut the scalloped and strips from the white with the flowers.

I layered the cut strips on gray cardstock and left the middle open which is where I strayed a bit from the sketch. The  "thanks so much" stamp is from Papertrey Ink. I inked the edges of the gray cardstock with Black Soot distress ink.

 

The layered paper flowers are Creative Memories and a pink brad in the center. I sprayed the entire flower with Perfect Pearls.

 

Here is a close up so you can see the shimmer of the Perfect Pearls.

I added some leaves from my stash to finish off the flower and card.
I was too late with my card to link it up over at Sketchbook Saturday :(  but look forward to playing again.

Have a great week!

Teresa

Lavender Festival and Our Beautiful World

Hello and good morning fellow bloggers!
I'm here to share my photos from the famous Lavender Festival that is held on the third weekend in July each year come rain or shine. This year it was fabulous weather sunny but I don't think it reached 80 degrees so" it was warm but not sweltering and there was a light breeze to keep you comfortable.
The street fair was wonderful to browse through then we went to a scrapbook store called "Doodlebugs" in downtown Sequim.
We had worked up an appetite after all of that shopping so we headed to this wonderful restaurant called the "Oak Table". I they serve breakfast all day and lunch in their quaint restaurant. The food is delicious and service is fast and friendly.
Now that we had satisfied both our shopping habit and tummies we were ready to hit the lavender farms.
There are many but we only went to two and we decided to support the smaller farms this year.

 I know this is not lavender but the lavender farms always have pretty gardens with many other beautiful flowers.

 Love the bright sunny yellow.

 This farm had a duckpond with a fountain. It was such a lovely day to enjoy walking around the gardens.

 It is days like today that you wish could last forever.

  Here are the ducks!

 This lavender is called Royal Velvet.

 This is the second farm we visited. I believe it was called Sunshine and was a bit bigger.

 I loved the purple fence in the background.

 

 These last two photos are for Our Beautiful World. This week we are to share photos of lace and share the story behind it. If you love lace you should take a look over there.
The only lace I have really have is the lace curtains that we have in the two windows in our dining/family room. I'm not sure that they are really lace but they have that lacy feeling. The family that we bought the house from left them and I really liked them so I left them up. Several people have commented on them so apparently they like them too.

They give such a light and airy feel to the room especially in the summer time. The other reason I like them is they are so easy to wash and need no ironing.

 Here is a card that I used a lace bow and the background looks kind of like lace too.

Here's a close up of the lace bow. We have a wedding to go to this month so I made the card for the happy couple.

Thanks so much for the visit! Have a great weekend!

Teresa

Getting My Scrap On

Hello there! You won't be seeing any cards here today. Instead for the last three days I have been working on scrapbook pages. It feels so good to get photos scraped  I don't know why I have strayed to making mostly cards.(not that that is a bad thing.) I have only made five scrapbook pages so far this year. You don't want to know how many cards I have made.:)
 Any way onto my pages:

I didn't use any sketches just went with the flow of the photos and journaling. This is the trip we just took up to  Hurricane Ridge last week. You can see the photos here in this post.

Here is the first page.

I cut the title with dies from a photo I decided I wasn't going to use.

I used a jounaling block and stamped the date and the sentiment that I put together using Technique Tuesday stamps from Ordinary Days by Ali Edwards. It is two different stamps for the sentiment and the third is the heart stamp. The date stamps I have no idea what company they are from.

 For the second page I used another journaling mat for my story.

 

 I used a wood grain embossing folder on kraft paper and inked it with Walnut Stain distress ink. I used punches for the trees and a Creative Memories punch for the little black car.

 

 The sentiment really said "Have a sunshiny day"(and is a Verve stamp) I taped off the word "have" and stamped it in Timber Wood Memento ink. The sun is from Inkadinkado: Coastal and fussy cut and the mushrooms are from Technique Tuesday: Oh Deer and stamped in Timber Wood Memento Ink then hand cut.

This is the last two pages.

I stamped the border using a Hero Arts Pine Boughs stamp in Walnut Stain ink.

I used strips of cardstock for the jounaling that I did on the computer.

 And this is the last page.

 I really thought this bunch of delicate flowers growing in the rocks was so pretty so I cut the photo apart to make it stand out a bit more.

 I have had this stamps set, Oh Deer from Technique Tuesday for a couple of years and have been waiting for just the right project to use it on. I really don't do cute cards so the opportunity never came up until now. The little guy is so cute and does look better in real life. I stamped the fawn in Tuxedo Black ink onto brown cardstock. Then I used a white pen to color in the spots and a black Glaze pen for his nose, eye and hooves. Lastly I cut him out by hand.

I am a bit rusty when it comes to scrapbooking but I really enjoyed the process and the end results. I hope I am back in the groove and start scarping regularly like I use to.

Thanks for dropping by and come again soon.

Teresa