Better with a Dog......Wha-aat??? FWF 9-16

Occasionally, I get asked by my readers if we have a dog, along with all of our cats.  The answer is yes.  This is Growler.  She is one of the homeliest mixed breed (Germ. shorthair, Austr shep, and lab) dogs ever, but she adores us.  She knows her rank in life.  Humans are top.  Next come the cats.  Next come the chickens.  Then comes Growl-Girl.  ("Oh, boy!!!  You guys are the humans; I'm just the dog!!!  I like knowing my place!!!")

Growler looking guilty about something....could be any number of things!

She is probably the most under-loved of all of our pets, since we are all such cat people, but she is a good farm dog.  She barks the deer away (mostly) and announces the arrival of (some) visitors with a bark.  She is gentle with all the other pets and with children.  She is death on raccoons, even at her advanced age (around 12, I think). And.... she never poops in the yard!  LOL... Hey, that's a big thing!!!

We never have been able reliably to keep her at home because her head is smaller than her neck and she can slip out of any collar....Houdini out of any harness......dig out of any pen (or get completely scraped up trying).....and jump or climb over any fence.  Now that she is old and arthritic, she stays home a little bit better....keyword: "little"...but I still see her out in the neighboring pastures quite frequently.  With her large chest cavity, she has immense lung power for her size and used to run and run and run following us in the car for nearly a mile when we went to town.  Now she realizes that she has to walk all that way back, so she doesn't do that as much....just follows us to church sometimes and sits in the back of the truck waiting for a ride home.  Awwww.....

So why all the space dedicated to a dog?  Well, I guess I am feeling a little bit sentimental about pets that I take for granted.  My hubby just had to put down one of our older kitties who was riddled with cancer.  Scooter was one of our favorite kitties.  She always had a cheery greeting for us in her funny, scratchy voice.  She didn't appreciate the other kitties too much and spent most of the last 4 years at our next-door neighbor's house.  He really liked her......even though she was responsible for him slipping on the ice a couple winters ago and breaking his leg in two places near his ankle!!!  Ouch!  

So here's to pets that are under-appreciated.....and to ones that we miss.  Love and miss you, Scoot-Baby.  Love you, also, Growl-Dog.  Thank you for being our friends.

 
Hi, Friends....

I am here with my Unity - Friends with Flair project for the week.  Are you like I am with lots of wonderful Unity stamps that sit under-loved and under- or un-used in your stash????  I noticed that I tend to use the same ones over and over and don't make the effort to figure out a way to use some of the others.  So for my FWF projects for the rest of the year, I am going to try to use ones that haven't seen ink yet.  Anyone else want to challenge themselves to that with me?  

I keep my Unitys in a binder in clear pocket pages and on the first page was the "Life is Better with a Dog".  Ha.  Well, I am not totally convinced this sentiment is true (being a cat person and all....) but true to my resolve, I pulled it out to use.  I paired it up with a Unity pawprint stamp for this project.  Not sure if I have used the paw print before or not, but I know I haven't used the sentiment.  lol...  So, I am also linking this card up to Darnell's NBUS #5 Challenge.  

Are you sensing a theme here????  Under-appreciated pets and under-appreciated stamps?  Okay, good.  I had an idea you might need a little help tracking with my weird thought processes.  (I use the term "thought processes" loosely!  Ha.) 

Okay, here is my dog card dedicated to our sweet Growl-Baby.  Thank you for being our friend, dear old dog.

I did something I am not sure I have ever done before.  It's crazy, but I used only brand new sheets of coordinating papers from one collection (the dog sheets in the DCWV Pets Stack), in addition to the kraft.....NO SCRAPS!!!   (Well, okay, the kraft sentiment panel was a scrap...but none of the patterned papers were!)  It was so fun to mix these around to make my design, following the Viva la Verve Week One sketch.  

I stamped the paw prints in Tea Dye Distress Ink and curved the sentiment a bit and stamped it over the still moist (...or muddy!) paw prints with Versafine Ink in Onyx Black.  Then I heat embossed all the stamping with clear powder.  The adhesive ribbons all came from a clearance set that somehow coordinates perfectly with the DCWV papers.  (How did that even happen???  Who knows....but I love it when it does!)  Later on, I added a tiny turquoise rhinestone to the poodle's hairdo, but I didn't take another shot of it....so you'll have to use your imagination!  Ha. 

Thank you for laboring through this long post.  I appreciate your comments and encouraging words.  Be sure to tell me if you want to join me in trying to use the underloved Unity in our stashes for the rest of the FWFs this year!!!

<3
Janis

Thank you for the honor of entering this card in the following challenges:
1.  Unity - Friends with Flair
2.  NBUS Challenge #5 - Use some Never Before Used Schtuff (the Unity sentiment stamp)
3.  Vive la Verve September Week 1 Sketch Challenge

4.  Cards in Envy - Inspired by a Song  "Thank You for Being a Friend"
5.  The Kraft Journal Challenge #241 - Take Your Pick (I used Patterned Paper, Embossing, and Ribbon)