That Friday Feeling...12/08/11

This week's theme is ELEPHANTS! Another great animal that I love. One of my most memorable experiences was visiting an elephant sanctuary in Kerala, India about 5 years ago and it really stuck with me. The highlight of the day had been washing the elephants in the river and then helping to lead them all back to their various homes. We didn't get the opportunity to ride them - they were sanctuary elephants that had been used for work but had either been mistreated or were too old for further work. There were a few baby elephants though and they were SO cute! I've seen a few elephants over on Etsy so thought they would make an interesting theme. So here are today's shout out pieces - enjoy!

You have to love these little ellie brooches by CLScraftcreations. They are so adorable!

Elephant pouches by SugarCane. I like the blue one best... 

Cute little magnet from Fabthomson

And a gorgeous elephant print by CarolineRoseArt. 

As always you get a few snippets of information about elephants...

• Did you know that female elephants are pregnant for 2 YEARS - that's a very long time to be pregnant for...! 
• Once a baby elephant has been born, all the female elephants in the herd help to raise the baby - elephants are very community-spirited. If the offspring whimpers or is upset the other elephants will go over to caress and touch it. Isn't that such a lovely thing to know?
• Elephants can live to about 70 years old and reach maturity when they are about 14
• Trunks are not used for drinking with - water is sucked into them and then squirted into the elephant's mouth.
• Elephants are covered in stiff hairs - it was quite weird touching and washing elephants as I had always assumed they have smooth skin. They don't - it's really rough and the hairs are really tough and inflexible.
• Asian elephants are more closely related to the extinct mammoth than they are to African elephants. 
• Because they are so large, adult African elephants have no predators other than man, elephant calves however can fall victim to lions and crocodiles. 
• In many countries, elephants are viewed as a symbol of wisdom. 

Love the Weekend

It's been a good weekend - well apart from the fact that I haven't left the flat in days and am going a little crazy... But I was really excited on Friday when I checked my e-mail and discovered that I had sold 2 (yes, 2) mosaic necklaces! How great is that? So a massive thank you to Julia from MyApplique who bought them (check out her Folksy shop - it's cute!) Part of me is a little sad to see them go - the mosaic one is one of the very first necklaces I made, and the Red Reflection one is my favourite design. But I'm glad they're going to such a nice person. Just in case you've forgotten what they look like - here are the two necklaces in their boxes about to be put in the post:

Posting these turned out to be harder than expected. I don't have business cards yet (because that would make me feel like a grown-up) so up to now I've been printing off a small card with the Creating Trouble logo on it and using it instead. Except for last night my printer decided it just didn't like me. At all. After about an hour or so messing around with it, Andy decided to try printing with the same printer from his Mac. And of course, it liked him. Admittedly we only managed to get one piece of paper out of it in full colour, and normally my cards are a LOT smaller than half an A4 sheet, but at least we managed to get something!

It was such a palaver (love that word!) Andy decided to design and order me some business cards. They should be arriving on Wednesday or Thursday and I'm really excited to see them!

AND... I follow quite a few other blogs and tend to comment when I see something I like or get asked a question. This weekend Kate from Scientific Culture posted a picture of one of her yetis and asked what people were up to this weekend. Apparently my comment was the most interesting response (it involved turning into a Yeti to be able to move) and she's sending me one of her cute badges! How cool is that?

Go & check out Scientific Culture on Etsy - really cute badges & more!

I'm getting a Yeti Thumbs Up badge... it's so cute! And in fact has quite a lot of character so I think he deserves a name... Any suggestions? Thank you Kate for deciding to send me a badge :-D