Have You?

Wondering why you should bother voting?  You must read this.

Monthly Walk

Here at Vantage House, the Fitness department sponsors a monthly walk/hike on the first Tuesday of the month.  Tomorrow we are supposed to go to the Jones Fall Trail in Baltimore but I think the rain we are having today will continue tomorrow.

In October the destination was the National Mall in Washington, DC. A group of us walked from our let out point at the National Gallery to the Washington Monument and back.  I grabbed these photos on what was a lovely October day, one of very few.

 National Gallery of Art

Our destination point looms large.

We did take a pit stop in the sculpture gardens.

Luckily one of us remembered a rest room was on the backside of the cafe.

The Smithsonian Castle across the Mall from our path.

This Smithsonian building has been undergoing a major renovation.

This one had the same thing several years ago.

The newest Smithsonian is African American Culture and Heritage.

On the far side of the Washington monument grounds we could see the reflecting pool and Lincoln Memorial.  Too far to walk today.

There was a fence around the monument.  Repairs still being made from the earthquake of several years ago?

Walking back we see the Capitol.

Here was our meeting point!

Finally Fall

Okay I must admit I put the camera on vivid setting.

Here's one without that.

Usually by the beginning of November the trees around here are bare of leaves.  We've had a very late fall showing of color.

Getting Ready for Christmas

I am a card maker so for Christmas that means a lot of time needed to make the cards I will send.  Living here at Vantage House means even more cards to give out.

I've been busy, but I'm not done yet.  Here's what I've made so far.

This first set I spent this morning on.  It was much more detail than I thought but they were my own design.

I wanted to make wreaths so used two different sized circle thinlits to cut the wreaths out.  I used the holes from the centers to make two cards with Christmas bulbs hanging.

The birds were punched as were the ribbons.

These three cards I made this week.  I got the idea for the two on the right from Pinterest.

For this one I glued on the plaid strip stamped Merry Christmas then used a post it note to block that portion and stamped the trees.  The green snowflake paper is corrugated by embossing.  I had a lot of trouble with this because the paper disintegrated in the Big Shot while embossing.  Finally I reread the embossing folder directions which suggested breaking the paper fibers by curling the paper over the edge of a table.

The snowflake on here I embossed directly on the card.

This set I did at my Stampin Up distributors Stamp a Stack event for September.  I'm going to the October gathering tomorrow to make 12 more cards (3 of 4 designs).

I purchased the buffalo check stamp and made some more of this design.  My modification is on the right.

Do you send Christmas cards?