I love Blue! All shades and so I was having fun using my color bursts on two pieces of cardstock. You just sprinkle some dust on and spritz with water. You see the colours just bust forth and you can create some great colour combos.
I cut the 2 different coloured cardstock and placed them on a basic cardstock. I stamped the images in black and heat embossed them in clear dye Embossing powder. I cut out a circle around my critters and added them to the middle of my page obviously, over the colorful tape. I added some stars and border corners to create the effect I wanted. I hope you all had a great day!
March 1st…is it a lion or a lamb in your area? It’s been both in the same day the last 2 days. In one day we went from a high of 15C down to -8 in 2 hours. I woke up the 29th to a blizzard only to be gone in 40 minutes…crazy! January was not very diverse since we watched all of Downton Abbey including the movies. So let’s get to it and I will try…try to be brief…
MOVIES
1. DOWNTON ABBEY-2010-1015 plus 2019 & 2022
Brilliant show! Love Maggie Smith who has never watched the show.
2. 23 PACES TO BAKER ST-1956
A blind man is obsessed in finding out what really happened. Not bad and reminds me of the TV show “Longstreet” starring James Franciscus.
3. GEOSTORM-2017
Gerard Butler in a disaster movie where he ends up in space. Frivolous flick but mindless fun
4. BARBIE-2023
I don’t get the hoopla, to be honest. I think the gem is Kate McKinnon as Weird Barbie
5. FOR A FEW DOLLARS MORE-1965
Great middle film of the Spaghetti Western trilogy that stars Clint Eastwood. The music, by Ennio Morricone, is beyond brilliant and haunting.
6. MR. HOLMES-2015
Ian McLellen plays an old Sherlock Holmes who retires to the country with his bees and meets his housekeeper and her son. Well acted.
7. OPPENHEIMER-2023
Brilliant film about the man who designed the bomb. Deserves the accolades
8. NEWS OF THE WORLD-2020
Tom Hanks brings the news to the people in towns across the U.S. and comes across a German girl who was being brought back to her kinfolk after living with the Natives who killed her parents. It has good action scenes but is a character study as well and one of hope and family.
9. BRIDGE OF SPIES-2015
Tom Hanks plays a lawyer who must negotiate the release of captured pilot, Gary Powers, from the Soviets during the days of the Cold War when the Berlin Wall was going up. Excellent true story with Mark Rylance winning an Oscar as a Soviet spy caught in the U.S.
10. SUITE FRANCAISE- 2014
Romance between a French woman and a German officer during the early days of WW2. This is an excellent film that brings up more than just a romance…it is so much more.
11. VICTORIA & ABDUL-2017
Judi Dench as Queen Victoria, again, this time being enthralled by a visiting Indian and wishes to learn more about his culture, language and him much to the chagrin of her bratty kids.
TV SHOWS
1. FROM WHERE THEY STOOD-2021
Very sad but brilliant documentary about holocaust survivors who took pictures while in the camps and how the people, today, try to find where these photos were taken.
2. UPROOTED: THE JOURNEY OF JAZZ DANCE-2020
A very interesting journey about how jazz dance came to be from the streets to movie musicals and beyond. Love it!
3. GHOSTS, THE BRITISH VERSION-2019-2023
The original British sitcom about a woman who inherits a crumbling mansion and she and her husband decide to turn it into a B & B. I’m not done but, I have to admit, I like the American version better. It’s still fun but I have a hard time understanding what her husband says.
I watch more TV but I already mentioned the shows in the past. I hope to see more Oscar noms so we shall see. What have you seen?
Are any of you celebrating a birthday today? Do you know of anyone who is? I could not find movies about the leap year…there is one, I believe, but that’s it…I think. Anyhoo, let’s see if March comes in like a lamb or a lion. It appears, in my neck of the woods is more like a lamb or a timid lion. Ok, I have a theme with my 3 film choices and let’s see if you guess what the theme is…
1. PUBLIC ENEMY-1931
This film is directed by one of my favourites, “Wild Bill” William Wellman, who made a star out of James Cagney as a brutal thug come gangster who is equal parts psychopath, sociopath, and brute. We see how he and his friend rise up in the gangster era with their molls played by Mae Clarke, Joan Blondell and Jean Harlow. The famous scene where Cagney pushes a grapefruit into Mae Clarke’s face was unscripted and caught Mae Clarke by surprise. The last scene is, to me, still one of the most brutal scenes done on film. Wellman could create a crisp, finely tuned film. His film, “Wings”, is the first best picture winner with great aerial battles that look quite realistic. It should be since Wellman was the first American to be part of the Lafayette #87 during WW1 and he received the Croix De Guerrero with 2 palms. I need to read his biography.
2. UP IN ARMS-1944
This was the first major film of Danny Kaye who plays a hypochondriac who gets drafted into the army. His best friend, Dana Andrews, volunteers, to keep an eye on his dumb ass friend. Their girlfriends join up as nurses but the gals like the other friend. Dinah Shore was the gal who really wanted Danny Kaye and they provide some good scenes with Dinah Shore singing some really pretty songs. Dinah Shore was more famous as a singer and, later, on TV shows including her daytime tv show plus dating Burt Reynolds. I need to watch this fun movie again as I haven’t seen it in decades.
3. THE FABULOUS DORSEYS-1947
I watched this movie last year and, the acting of these 2 famous brothers has a little to be desired but it’s entertaining for the music that they can do in spades. The 2 brothers are shown how they rise from obscurity to become famous but they quarrel…a lot! This one gal, played by Janet Blair, is trying to play peacemaker. In actuality, the 2 brothers did fall out back in 1935 over the way a song was being played but they did make this film and were on TV together where they introduced Elvis Presley. Jimmy Dorsey, who smoked and drank and died in 1957 from lung cancer, was brilliant for playing the Flight of the Bumblebee in one breath!
February has been warmer than ever, not good for the trees and plants and today it is supposed to hit 14C! It will be warm until Friday and plummet 20 degrees in a few hours...so March might be coming in like a lion or lamb. Our Kaspar is a lion who is sleeping like a sweet lamb so I thought this picture works.
Over at Monday Music Moves Me, we are talking about leap and/or jump. Obviously, that song by Van Halen came into my head but it was played to death back in the 80s and I found their video,...gross. I went another way as I like to do. Here are my 3...
1. JUMPIN' JIVE BY CAB CALLOWAY
I thpught of this great song and dance number by the superlative Nicholas Brothers. They should be in the same realm as Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly but, they are Black so...so very sad. This is from the film, "Stormy Weather", that featured an all black cast( Bill "Bojangles" Robinson and Lena Horne heading) with this number a highlight. I just don't know how they did this but they are breathtaking.
2. JUMP FOR JOY SUNG BY IVY ANDERSON-1941
This lady has a beautiful voice and died too young from heart failure. She had diabetes and other ailments but Bing Crosby helped her out always because she helped him when he was starting out and he never forgot.
3. TAKE A LEAP SUNG BY JULIE ANDREWS AND DAVID HYDE PIERCE-2017
I hope I found the right video for this song. This is quite a sweet song and, to be honest, I'm not sure it is from 2917 because Julie Andrews lost her singing voice a long time ago due to a botched vocal chord surgery to remove polyps but she is here singing with David who played Frazier's brother Niles.
This is an old style but I never made one like this and it was fun. I took a scrap paper, a sponge and a dye ink pad, in apricot brown, and started to create the geometric shapes. I placed down the paper onto a cardstock I had floating around for a while ( I created the background using red and green distress ink with water). I took a few small stamps and bigger evergreen ones along with brown, green and red dye ink pads and started to stamp. To make sure you don’t stamp in other areas, you cover the area you don’t want stamped with posted notes. Once that was all stamped, I added the bow and the saying.
I used my cuddlebug and an embossing folder I’ve had for a while but never used. I took some grey cardstock, cut it so it fit the folder and took my red dye ink and rub it on the flat side. I pressed it through and the red came right onto the card. I coloured in the rose and leaves with a glitter pen for some added oomph. I stamped my sweet pussy cat in black and used my tombow markers to colour in my pussy cat plus I added some glitter, obviously. I fussy cut her out and glued her in place. I added the hearts, the green leaves and the wood flower, that I coloured in red with the dye ink pad, and glued them in place. I placed it on some green cardstock, with some stamped greenery in green dye ink and voila!
Before I start, I will let you know who won the Oscar from yesterday’s song post. Once again, Joel got it right…”I’m Easy” won the Oscar while the theme from “Mahogany” was nominated and the other song from “Nashville” got nuttin.
Now, there are a ton…a ton of romance films from all genres but it’s almost always with young people and I do think, at times, that love is wasted on the young. I decided to talk about films that deal with old love and I went with a theme within a theme choosing all TV movies. Here are my 3…
1. LOVE AMONG THE RUINS-1975
This stars 2 greats, Katherine Hepburn and Laurence Olivier and directed by the great George Cukor who directed Hepburn 10 times, I believe. Hepburn plays a woman who loves ‘em and drops them with her latest paramour, a much younger man, being upset and sues her. She decides to fight and hires a famous barrister, played by Olivier, forgetting that she did the same thing to him 40 years ago but he still carries a torch for her. This is a lovely movie that is romantic during the early years of the 20th century. It may not be the best of Hepburn’s films or Olivier’s but it is nice to watch.
2. SUMMER SOLSTICE-1981
I saw this film when it first came out and thought it was a great swan song for both of these great actors. This film was the last film for both of them but you wouldn’t know it because they acted so well together. It’s the story about a married couple of 50 years and the ups and downs they went through in their marriage. It is a very good film about marriage and the highs and lows. I always loved Myrna Loy who got a Great role in this film and she acted her heart out.
3. ONE SPECIAL NIGHT-1999
This is the 3rd and last pairing of James Garner and Julie Andrews who became great friends when they first met in the early 1960s and figured they must have kissed 500 times. In fact Julie Andrews always said Garner knew how to kiss because, in their first film, after he kissed her, her legs buckled. They decided to star in this TV movie about a man whose wife has dementia and is in long term care and Andrews plays a doctor. One snowy night near Christmas, his car get stuck and she picks him up only to get stuck herself. They find an unused cabin and spend a wonderful night, without any hanky panky, talking and find they actually have much in common. Unfortunately, a series of errors and misunderstandings, keeps them apart but you know something will happen to bring them together. Another sweet and touching film with a love that happens to people who are over 30.
What movies can you think of that deals with a love between 2 older people?
So I decided to choose another year from the 1970s because I haven’t been back to the 70s in a long time. 1975 is a fun time with Jaws and Disco making headway. I’m joining in with the Monday Music Movies Me, even though it’s Wednesday. Let’s see if you can figure out which song won the Oscar, which one was nominated and which came up with neither…
1. I’M EASY SUNG BY KEITH CARRADINE
This song, is from the film, “Nashville” directed by Robert Altman with a star studded cast and a film that I really want to see. This film was written and sung by Keith Carradine from the famous Carradine clan whose father was John Carradine and brother was David Carradine.
2. IT DON’T WORRY ME SUNG BY KEITH CARRADINE
Yup, this come from the same film and was also written and sung by Keith Carradine. I had no idea he was so talented.
3. DO YOU KNOW WHERE YOU’RE GOING TO SUNG BY DIANA ROSS
This song comes from the movie, “Mahogany” starring Diana Ross and…it’s a dumb ass movie but it’s fun with the fashion and it has this song. This was written by Mike Messer( music) and Gerry Goffin ( lyrics) and became a huge hit for Ross.
So can you guess who won, who was nominated and who got nuttin’?
