Baby card

Hello! How are you? I'm feeling a bit frazzled, back at work after a week-and-a-bit's vacation. We went to Newfoundland to visit relatives. More on that below, if you are interested.

About the card - I am going to a baby shower and needed a card. I started with this lovely black and white photo from a Darkroom Door Montage sheet (Hello Baby collection) and clipped it out, and tinted the sweater with pink distress ink in a couple of shades. Mounted it on grey linen, then popped up off another layer of grey linen when it turned out to be too small for the final card. The next piece down is white, embossed in the Cuttlebug, and sponged with pumice stone. Next down is dark grey, then the same grey linen, stamped with a scroll (Stampers Anonymous) in Lake Mist. Then the card base is Pirouette Pink, stamped with Linen (Stampin' Up!) in Spun Sugar, which didn't show up very well, but I thought another stamp would be too busy. The "sweet baby girl" is from SU's Everyday Flexible Phrases and didn't turn out well when I stamped it down, so I did it ransom-note style on gray linen and dotted some liquid pearls around it. Then everything was going on down in that corner and the light grey on the other side couldn't hold it, so more liquid pearls went up on the top corner. I also discovered I need pewter liquid pearls (is there such a thing?) and I don't have light pink either. How did that happen? Must remedy that. Had the perfect shade of embroidery floss and spent a happy half hour reviewing all my buttons to find the almost-perfect one. Ideally it should have been a four-holer to match the picture, but it's a two-holer, which is easier for tying bows anyway. I'm quite happy with this - pink and pretty but not too precious. Hope she likes it!

Re Newfoundland: Had a great time - saw whales, lots of scenic vistas, even splashed in the North Atlantic. The girls were the only ones brave enough to get completely wet, and they had to be hauled out of the waves when the bystanders got too cold to watch anymore.... We were at a wonderful sandy beach (rare, most beaches are rocky) and the waves were wonderful. Came home with some bakeapple jam and more bakeapples besides. The bakeapples were ripe so hubby and his folks spent three evenings on the mash picking them. I declined, as there were already more than enough opportunities to tramp around in the bog. I think those are delights best appreciated by someone who grew up doing it. CFAs (come from away) just can't quite savour the fly bites and wet feet properly. I am, however, quite happy to savour the bakeapple jam! Bakeapples are a berry that grows on the bog or mash as it's locally known, and you might know them as cloudberries. They are orange when ripe, and can be red and yellow. They smell heavenly and make delicious jam. I also came home with my husband's old Olivetti typewriter. There was a bit of grumbling about packing it (weighs close to 50 lb), but hubby came through for me. Now it's right in the thick of things, back to work, girls in daycamp, soccer, swimming, haircuts, meetings, all the normal stuff. Hard to imagine it was only a few days ago I was ankle deep in a cliff-top peat bog, I mean gazing out over the bay with the wind in my hair. Yes, you read that right, I did organize a family hike on the Cape English trail, which goes up over the clifftops at Cape English. The "path" doesn't go right to the edge of the cliff, but there are enough alarming views to cure me of any desire to go anywhere near a cliff any time soon. It was all perfectly safe and we were at least 100 feet away from the edge and the brink of certain death. And hubby assured me that he never heard of anyone vanishing in a sinkhole in a peat bog either. Well, that's enough rambling about our holiday - it was great, I highly recommend Newfoundland as a vacation destination, and ideally you should stay with someone who is a fantastic cook! Apropos of nothing, I would recommend flying Porter - liked everything about it and it was really fast. Our car rental was a Ford Fusion, and since I have been watching so much Top Gear, I now feel qualified to do an automobile review. Like all Fords, this one is built for a race of giants, and they try take your mind off the disappointing performance with lots of rumble and roar and a 3d-effect dashboard. The one good thing about it was the trunk, which was big enough to hold our Prius and a team of sled dogs. The girls didn't like it since, not belonging to a race of giants, they couldn't see out the back windows. Still, it got us around, which was the point in the end.

Must dash - rambled enough! If you made it this far, well done! You can add another 600 miles to your frequent blogger account.