These photos are some I took of Gus a couple of weeks ago to help his parents raise money for an operation he needs to have. Here's the skinny on what poor Gus has been dealing with.
- Earlier this year he was hit by a car and broke his right hind leg. Had to get a pin in his leg.
-After getting the pin removed Gus's right hind leg broke again because of a sequestrum when the original break was healing.
- Found out Gus also suffers from luxating patella in his left hind leg, which is "a condition in which the patella, or kneecap, dislocates or moves out of its normal location."
- On top of that his left hind leg has Legg-Calve-Perthes syndrome, which is a "degenerative disease of the hip joint, where growth/loss of bone mass leads to some degree of collapse of the hip joint and to deformity of the ball of the femur and the surface of the hip socket."
Gus's x-ray--notice the difference between both hip joints
So, because of the sequestrum, Gus will always have a very weak right hind leg-- with the very likely potential of it breaking again. Since this leg is actually the "stronger" of the two because of the conditions that plague is left hind leg, Gus must undergo surgery to have a bone graph as well as having a metal plate inserted. Amputation was considered, but again, because of his left leg being lame, surgery would wield a much better outcome for his mobility.
The surgery will cost at least $3,000.
Since it's something they can't put off for very long, Gus's parents have set-up a Paypal donation to try and raise some of that money. They also set up a Save Gus community on Facebook where they will soon be holding raffles and giveaways. If donating is not something you are able to do, just simple keeping Gus in your thoughts or passing the word around would be amazing! Gus is a tiny dog full of love and I'm sure he would give you all a huge lick if he could! <3
Of course, right after I say in this post that we were never sent our photo in the giant coffee photo booth--it shows up in my inbox!
I had typed in my name as being "Mary Awesome" because I didn't want them to have my last name, so when I was also prompted to write something "I realized", I typed in this profound statement. ;D
I'm glad I didn't give them my last name now too because they are posting people's names on the site...tsk tsk!
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Hope everyone in the South is alright! We had some pretty nasty storms last night, but luckily Atlanta missed the worst of it.
My friend Stephanie over at Femmena Mala has just opened up her own Etsy shop! It's full of fun fabric button rings like the one pictured above, as well as fabric button necklaces and hair clips! Stephanie is also offering, for the first month, 20% off your order when you use code WELLHELLO
Now until May 6th, there is Gallery Nucleus is hosting: ADVENTURE TIME: A LOOK BEHIND THE LAND OF OOO! I wish I lived closer to California so I could check it out. Matt and I actually dressed up as Marceline and Finn last year, but I didn't get any pictures. :( You can see Stinker sporting Matt's Finn hat here though.
If spiders freak you out- DO NOT WATCH THIS VIDEO. I had never heard of this spider up until last Friday. It's so tiny and his mating dance is quite amazing. [and you'll see why he is called a Peacock Spider]
It took me forever to finish "My So-Called Life", but I've now moved on to this! I'm about 5 episodes in and I'm not sure if I'll be able to make it through the 107 episoded Netflix has--but we will see. I'm open to all guilty pleasure suggestions to add to my queue though. :D
I want a Kindle! I've been reading A Game of Thrones on Matt's and I'm hooked! I like how it gives you the percentage of how far into the book you had read at the bottom--it's a constant reminder of how much more I have in this book! heh
A couple of weekends ago Atlanta had it's annual Dogwood Festival. I love checking it out every year...and trying all the free samples! ;)
Every year I leave with a free bag of Zone bars!
When this photo was taken we were asked to write down something we lived for, so I wrote down "Crafting" in the only marker color avaliable--brown. :\ I tried to raise the speech bubble above my head, but the guy behind the camera made me lower it. So, apparently Meredith's stomach really likes crafting. heh
We also got free iced coffees-yay! That giant coffee cup actually was a photobooth, but they never sent me the photo they took inside.
This photo was taken at the bad movie night I made the Troll 2 cupcakes for. None of us noticed we were all wearing black and white stripes until I was actually leaving. I love stripes--like really really love them. Matt has to stop me from only buying striped clothes. :X
The Summer craft season is a upon us once again and I couldn't be more excited! I love attending craft festivals, and I really love being a vendor at them. I'm happy to announce that I will be returning for my second year to Athens Indie Craftstravaganzaa!
I hope some of you can make it out to this event--I'd love to meet all of you! :D
On Friday night, Matt and I went to a friend's bad movie night party. Since I love making themed cupcakes, I thought this would be a great time to make Troll 2 inspired cupcakes! In a nutshell, the movie is about a family vacationing in a small town when they discover the entire town is inhabited by goblins, who plan to turn them into plants and eat them. Yes, there are actually no trolls in Troll 2!
If you have never seen Troll 2, I included the trailer at the bottom. ;D
I just used a basic vanilla cake mix to make 24 cupcakes.
Once the cupcakes are cool, use a sharp knife to core the cupcakes. Make sure you angle the knife as you cut. You don't want to take too much from the middle and weaken the cupcake.
Put some white icing in a bowl and then add green food coloring. You can skip this step and just buy green icing. [I also removed my ring after this shot because icing can get messy]
Good to go!
Just spoon in some of the green icing. You can take even less out of the core if you want less icing in the middle.
Once you are done filling the cupcakes with green icing it is time to put the tops back on! Take your knife and cut the cone off the bottom and then place the cap back on. The icing in the middle should act as an adhesive to hold it in place.
After you add the caps back you shouldn't see any of the green icing! If some seeps through the sides just wipe it off before icing the top.
Now it's time to ice the top! I decided to ice these cupcakes with an icing bag and tip to prevent the cap from being moved or torn. Of course I didn't have enough icing, but you just want to make sure you cover the seam from where you cored the centers.
Iced and ready for one final touch!
"Nilbog is goblin spelled backwards!" [the name of the town the family visits]
It's not until your family and friends bite into your yummy cupcakes that they realize it's a trap! ;D
Hope you enjoyed my first tutorial as much as I enjoyed creating it!
Second: This FF is going to be a little different. Today we have a mission--to reunite some old photo albums with their families.
My friend, Claire, was given six old photo albums recently, and is now hoping to find their owners [or their families], and give them back their long lost photographs.
Claire has decided to make videos of each album in hopes that by people viewing them someone, somewhere, will have information on how to reunite them with their rightful owners. The album she is highlighting in this video belonged to a Sylvia Paret [the only one with a name in it]--so please watch it and see if anything seems familiar!
Sylvia Paret
For more information on Claire's quest, and for more photos of the albums/Sylvia Paret, check out these two posts on Claire's blog:
So my friend Kat just opened up an Etsy not too long ago called BunnySparkles. I think her Plant Vs. Zombies plushies are great! She also just added some pin-up illustrations of some childhood characters, like Rainbow Bright and Strawberry Shortcake--go give her some love. :D
Winners, please contact me at hello.maryrebecca@gmail.com **Winners have until Wednesday April 20th at MIDNIGHT [EST] to claim prize or new winners will be drawn
Back in January I made a post introducing you all to Stinker. Well, now it's time to introduce you to Stinker's older sister--Nibbler!
Matt adopted Nibbler several months before I met him, but I've grown to love her...and she loves tolerates me too. Nibbler isn't one to cuddle like Stinker does, but where she lacks in physical contact, she makes up with being one chatty catty! That was actually a driving force in why Matt adopted her--he loved that she liked to talk.
Cute fact: I sneeze a lot, especially in the Spring time. So Nibbler has picked up on the fact that when I sneeze Matt says, "Bless You"...so now every time I sneeze around Nibbler she goes, "Meow Mew"--ahh, so cute! She also knows when I'm faking because she won't do it unless I really sneeze.
She also has retractable thumbs because she opens doors and drawers a lot. She's stealth though, so we've never seen these elusive thumbs. ;) Oh, and if you close her out of the bedroom and she's hungry and wants you to wake up--you better believe this cat will body slam the door until you feed her. She don't mess around!
Plus she makes ridiculous faces...and has odd sleeping positions. Let me show you:
