The House of Contagion is happy to report it only has one inmate today. Both Laurel and a highly reluctant William went to school today. Dan went. Emily, however, stayed home. She started to get ready for school, but then her stomach started to hurt again. So I let her stay. William tried to tell me HIS stomach still hurt...yeah...he was the one bouncing all over his room yesterday. He neither looked nor acted particularly sick yesterday; I just kept him home just in case. So this morning I told him I gave him the benefit of the doubt yesterday, but he used up his one day off school pass for the year. He was not happy.
Emily, though, still looks sick and is being very quiet, which usually means she *is* sick. Unlike Laurel who is highly vocal and will let out little moans as she lies on the couch when ill, Emily just clams up.
Despite disease and contagion, we still managed to celebrate Emily's birthday. Emily is very much into Naruto, the Japanese Anime/Manga series. So when I bought her a poster book for Christmas, and it had an insert that showed all the posters in miniature, an insert that WOULD have gotten thrown away in any other household, but here in the Card-Making Capital of the Free World, we simply Do. Not. Throw. Away. Stuff. That. We. Can. Use. On. Cards, so I squirreled it carefully away.
Now, IF they made Naruto stamps, it would be different, of course. But they don't. So when making Emily a birthday card, I grabbed my throw away insert and got busy:
Ingredients: Stamps - Karen Foster Snap Stamps, SU! On Your Birthday - Casual Medium; Paper - Tangerine Tango, Summer Sun, Basic Black, Brushed Silver; Ink - Basic Black; Other - Silver Brads, black permanent liner pen, American Crafts ribbon.
Naruto is the main character in this series and this particular poster shows him with a weapon called a kunai. The title of the poster is "Kunai at the ready". Funny...I thought it might just have another purpose. This is what the inside of the card says:
I am fortunate that Emily now would find this funny...a few years back, I might have gotten an earnest explanation of what a kunai is. But as she ages she, like all proper descendants of my family tree, grows in sarcasm and snarky humor. I love having children who understand my humor.
Well, I do have another card to show, but I think I will make another post for that. Ta for now!












































