"Happy Birthday to Me" + Hiking Scrapbook Pages + Interesting Insects

That's right folks. Today is my birthday. I do believe that they mixed up the date on my birth certificate. It says I'm 65 today but really, 65? Oh well, that's what they go by so I guess I'm now officially a senior citizen. I'm cracking myself up just typing that! If only you really knew me you would find that hilarious too. My husband said to me once "Don't you think it's time you acted your age?" I said "No! I tried that once and it was no fun!"  He's given up on me! Life's too darn short to be serious about anything. 

Not much family around today but we did get to see and speak to one daughter and grandson via Skype. First time around using Skype and it was a great birthday present. So today we went to Rondeau for yet another BBQ, met up with sister Bette, and then Joe and I went on a 28km bike ride. The hi-light of the day was seeing a "stick fly". I didn't have a camera with me so Brady at the Visitor's Centre was kind enough to take a picture of it for me and emailed it to me. This is a stick fly.

Talk about being camouflaged! This is the most interesting insect I have ever seen.
We saw one other one similar to the brown stick fly, a green one, in 2010 when it landed on our thermos bottle at Point Pelee. I did have a camera that day and here is what it looked like. I'm pretty sure the green one is a type of stick fly too.

                        No, that is not a sticker. That is an insect! So cool!

If Joe and I are not out biking, we are out hiking. Here are two scrapbook pages about our hiking treks. Most are from Rondeau but a couple from Point Pelee.

and the two pages side by side looks like the one below:

The pictures were obviously not taken on the same day but they are all of us hiking somewhere so I just went with that theme. I actually took a stab at designing these  using digital templates from the Scrapbooks Etc. web site and it worked out pretty well. The only thing I don't like is that I have to print them off at home which uses a lot of ink. The commercial places crop them down too far and I can't seem to get around it.

The green leaves were from a Sizzix die and the title started out as white with black or brown swirls so I just painted them green...but blotchy green so it was more organic looking. If you look closely behind some of the green leaves you will see what looks like a shadow of them. I die cut a piece of flat sponge (that increases in size when wet) with the leaf die, wet it, ringed it out, and dabbed black paint on it, stamped it off a couple of times and then stamped on the background paper. I really liked that look and I'm glad it worked.

Hoping to see more family tomorrow as the birthday celebrations continue! Hope everyone is having a great long weekend.