It's raining, it's pouring

the old man is snoring.  I think I'm dating myself here.  We used to jump rope or hand slap to this tune when I was a kid.  Seriously, it started raining here early this morning and it's that nice gentle steady rain that looks like it might be around for a while, the kind of rain the farmers love and so do we.  The trees have been a bit droopy and the plants we've transplanted have been a little stressed even though we water them daily; sometimes twice a day.  I did manage to get out this morning and weed the new raised bed.  I found some chocolate mint in the new bed (that bed is now doomed) but I think I got most of it out.  The bees love chocolate mint, me....not so much.  Anything in the mint family will take over your garden as soon as you plant it and turn your back.  You might as well just call a bulldozer to dig up the whole bed and haul it away.  I've been fighting the mint since it came in attached to a plant someone gave me (he doesn't get Christmas cards from me anymore, you betcha); despite my best efforts, it has taken over the back flower bed.  It's one of the reasons we created the new raised bed and started moving plants into it.  I'm keeping an eagle's eye out for the mint and will jump on it like a duck on a june bug as soon as I see it.  Hopefully, it won't get away from me again.

I am a huge fan of Heather Telford. She's on the Penny Black Design Team and has probably inspired me to buy more stamps than any other person.  She reminds me why I started stamping in the first place - that pure joy of creating something with just ink and stamps - no layers, wire, flowers, tags or other embellishments.  I love the clean and simple look of her cards and totally steal most of her designs and use her tutorials to create cards (and buy Penny Stamps because she uses them).  This card doesn't have the same stamps but the design is completely lifted from her.

I never use my Tim Holtz stapler but pulled it out for this card.  The fern stamp is from Hero Arts, the butterflies are Martha Stewart, and the sentiment is from PTI.  It's simple, elegant, quick and gorgeous if I say so myself.