List of participants in the 333,333 giveaway draw

Hello dear readers,

Here are the names and numbers in order of the comments.

1.  Carmen. 2.  Claude.  3.  Munir.  4.  May.  5.  Nina.  6.  Eloisa.  7.  Elena.  8.  Isabel.  9.  Britt.
10. Melli.  11. Sheila.  12. Pilar.  13.  Alexandra Martinez.  14. Fabiola. 15.  Jodi. 16.  Ayla.
17. Alexandra.  18. Birgit.  19. Giac.  20. Maria.  21. Narina.   22. Anita.  23. Miyatur ve hobi.

24. Rebecca.  25. Penelope.  26. Teresa.  27.  Pirkko.  28. Blanca.  29. Leonor.

Congratulations to Melli!   Melli please email me your address so I can post your prize to you as soon as possible.

I wish to thank you all for taking part.  On 27 November my blog will celebrate its 7 year anniversary and there will be another giveaway.  I'll post more details within a few days.

Blessings to all my friends.

Magic wand returned to owner

Hello dear readers,


Here are the recorded events of how Lea, the young leopardess, with the help of the cats, found and retrieved Baalatova's precious magic wand.


Lea climbing up the tree where the wand is well hidden and guarded by two fercous black snakes.

At last, the camouflaged wand is seen.

After a tiring fight with the snakes, the wand was found and retrieved.

Baalatova is extremely happy and grateful to get her magic wand back.

Baalatova:

It's wonderful to be able again to make your and my wishes come true.

Skella: 
Are you going to make Drora pay for not building you your second floor?

Baalatova:
Drora who?...  Who needs her to build me a second floor?  With the lift of my wand and a few secret words of magic I can make myself a grand palace. 

Skelly:  What about our wishes to become ghosts?

Baalatova:
Look,  I'm lifting the wand but before I say the secret words of magic, please don't forget that you will  be ghosts for Halloween night only.  Tomorrow you turn back to skeletons.

The Skellies are extremely happy. 

They feel free and light and start to float away.

Baalatova:

Hey, come back!  Now that I'm without my broom crutches I  feel free and light.  I am going to join you and we shall all have fun together!

And all three, drift away ......

It was both silly and fun to concoct this tale.  I wish you all an enjoyable Halloween.

Tomorrow I'll be here again with the list of participants in my giveaway draw. 

Blessings!

Pipe cleaners kittens and puppies

Hello dear friends

To battle against the evil forces of Baalatova's enemy and bring back her precious wand, more cats are needed.  I tried in vain to find some miniature cats locally so decided to try making my own from pipe cleaners.  Also had to experiment for  teaching the elderly people, (some of them younger than I am), at the recuperation center.

Certainly, the next results will be better but here are my firsts.

The little one on the right has whiskers which can't be seen clearly in the photo.

And here come the puppies

I learned how to make these from tutorials on youtube.  For the kittens I used 1.5 pipe cleaners each.  For the puppies I used only one pipe cleaner.  The pipe cleaners length is 30 cm.
The eyes and nose are tiny Fimo balls.

I would like to bring back Baalatova's wand for the coming Halloween but dear friends, there is a
problem, a BIG one.  Didn't keep my promise to build her the second floor and she is quite mad at me.  Now if she gets her magic wand back who knows what she'll do to me.  H E L P !!!

Pumpkin curving art by Angel Boraliev https://www.facebook.com/atelierabcarving/

Happy Halloween and blessings

Dreaming of Haunting

Hello dear friends,

Halloween will be here very soon and some of you will want to know how things are with the Skellies.  Baalatova the witch is in their neighborhood and they got to be close friends.

Skella:

Hello Baalatova.  I see you are still using your brooms for walking.  We have come to visit you.

Baalatova:

Hello dears!  How nice of you to visit me. I'd love to invite you in but you see,  Drora did not keep her promise to build me a second floor and it's too crowded inside. Let's sit outside in the wood where it's nice and warm.

Skella:     

Thank you. We love to listen to your bygone days stories.

Baalatova:

I badly miss my magic wand which my rival, Baalzebob the wicked sorcerer captured. Without my wand I am hands tied and completely useless. The only thing left for me to do is collect herbs and concoct potions.

My magic wand was custom made especially for me.  No one else but me can use is.  With it  I can cast a spell and turn you into instant ghosts.  Of course,  the spell will only last one night, once a year only.  For that night we could chose Halloween for example.  This could  be a temporary solution for the time you have to wait to be accepted at the Ghost Academy  When, and if, you are a fully qualified Ghost Academy graduate you get a permanent residence to haunt in,  a good one if you receive excellent grades.   Then you  could haunt all the days of the year to your hearts' delight.

Skelly and Skella  dreaming and sighing sadly .....
           
Skelly:


We have to join forces and do something about returning your magic wand.  Recently our cats befriended a young stray leopardess, Lea.  She is a fierce snake fighter and a good tree climber. With the help of the cats Lea will maybe able to redeem your wand.  After all the trees haven't been checked yet.

Baalatova:

These are good news that call for celebrations.  Can I offer you a bowl of my delicious frogs eyes
soup?  Oh, sorry, I forgot, you don't eat anymore.

to be continued .......

Don't forget my giveaway on 31 October.  You only have to write a comment under my previous post to enter the draw. 

Blessings to all of you.

   

333,333 page views and a giveaway

Dear Readers,

Before I went to bed last night, I saw these fantastic figures of 333,333 page views on the side bar of my blog. (One third of a million!)  When I woke up this morning the number has already risen up. Well my dear readers this, by all means, deserves a giveaway.  I've created so many flowers lately and can spare some for the giveaway. but today I created, especially for this giveaway five cornflowers, to make a flower arrangement.

To take part in the draw you only have to be a follower of this blog and make a comment.  The draw will take place at the end of this month, October 31.  It's upto you if you want to make a link on your blog.

I wish you an enjoyable Sunday with blessings.

How to make birds of paradise flowers

Hello dear readers,

It's not difficult to create a mini Bird of Paradise flower.  You don't need special tools. Most of the materials are probably at hand.  So let me show my dear friend Pirkko and all of you how it's done.

For the flower head  I used a piece of heavy grocery paper bag, painted on both sides in green acrylic paint.  For the petals, I painted a plain computer strip of paper with navy blue and orange colors.
I didn't have at hand an orange marker. Instead I used a yellow marker and when dry I covered the yellow with a rose  marker (on both sides). This way I got the perfect orange that was needed.

A Bird of Paradise is a large flower, it's stem is thicker than the usual.  I achieved a thicker diameter by covering a piece of wire with green florist tape.  The metal wire is laid in the middle of the sticky tape and the tape is twisted around it.  A split in half tape makes a thinner stem.

These are the tools I used.

Fold about one centimeter of the green painted paper and with the nail scissors cut out, on the fold  a 1.5 cm long  leaf shape, as shown in the photos below.

Cut out narrow half-moons, on the fold, from the 2 cm wide strip of colored office paper.  6 pieces in orange and 2 pieces in navy blue.

Assemble the petals with a tiny drop of tacky glue.  Glue the stem to the middle of the leaf shaped flower head.

Glue the assembled petals to the top half of the leaf shape.

Fold the leaf shape up and and bend the stem down.  Ta dam you have a Bird of Paradise flower!

I wonder if my English is clear enough.  Please feel free to ask any questions if not.
I know the photos are not the best but I believe they explain what has to be done.  After you make one flower and see how easy it is you will want to make more.

A pleasant end of the week and blessings to all of you.