Through The Craft Room Door Anything Goes Challenge

This week's challenge is sponsored by Doodle Dragon Studios, home of very fun images. And I chose a real cutie, called Under Bear, for my card this week.

But before I go into my card description, I will add a few more photos from my trip. (Like it or not, I just can't help myself. It's kind of like a diary for me.) Because we had never visited the Big Island, we had to go to check out the volcanic action in Hawaii Volcanoes National Park. My sister, Merrilyn, had told me that the best time to view the action was at night, so my sweet, darling Gary booked a room for us at Kilauea Lodge for Friday night, (even though we were still booked into the Sheraton until Monday). 

Friday morning we left the Sheraton and headed south. We had read that there was really good food off the highway at the Coffee Shack. Naturally, we stopped there for breakfast. And the food was fabulous; the place was very busy, but they claimed business was slow. (We knew they were right on Monday, when we tried to go back there and couldn't get anywhere near the place to even park the van!) Gary took photos of the balcony seating, the view from the balcony, (complete with morning vog), and the breakfast we each ordered. Oh, gosh, it makes me hungry again right now to look at it.

Scrambled eggs with cheese, papaya filled with lilikoi yogurt, fruit, and coconut, and the most delicious banana bread, along with POG, (passionfruit, orange, and guava juice) and Chai lattes. Sigh....

We were stuffed as we waddled out of the Coffee Shack, hoisted ourselves back into the van and kept on southward-bound. There were places I wanted to see, like the southernmost spot in the U.S. at South Point, and the Green Sand (Mahana) Beach. However, you needed a 4-wheel drive to reach them, and our old fogies' van just wasn't going to cut the rough roads. So we continued on around the highway to go eastward toward the Kilauea volcano. 

Lucky for us, we could stop at a black sand beach, Punalu'u Beach, on the way. Was that ever a fabulous stop! Oh, my. It is illegal to take sand from the beach, so we didn't. But I did pick it up and it was the weirdest sand I have ever touched or seen. It was like picking up seed beads, really sparkly ones. It is not easy to walk through, as it is very sharp! We both got photos of the sand, the bay, and some waves.

And then Gary discovered that a green sea turtle was beached on the sand. FABULOUS! I heart sea turtles. I heart them a lot!

Now, there are signs at this beach that tell peeps to leave the turtles alone--to stay at least 15 feet away from them. (I have some great zoomed photos, but I was more than 15 feet from this turtle; it just doesn't look that way.) Anyway, some piece-of-work-woman walked right up to the turtle and told her husband to take a photo of her foot so people could see how big the turtle was. (It was probably 3-4 feet long. The turtle. Not her foot.) And a resident came over and told the woman it was against the law to get within 20 feet of a sea turtle. So this woman says, "Well, I guess I am just going to break the law then." Nice, huh? At first I thought maybe her husband would tell her to back away, but then I realized he was probably afraid to say anything to her! Ugh.

Here are zoomed shots of the beached turtle, followed by a shot that wasn't zoomed from where I was standing, so you can see how far away I actually was taking these photos:

After I took a lot of photos of this turtle, I walked further up the beach to where other turtles were feeding in the bay. I got some shots of one just beneath the surface and then one of it popping its head above water to breathe. The turtle is hard to see in the water, but it is next to the large rock area, about in the middle of the first picture. You'll probably have to click on the second one to enlarge it enough to see the turtle's head out of the water. 

I walked back to the beached turtle and took some more photos of it before we left. Then, before we went back to the van, I got a shot of a couple of trees near the beach. They were having a bad-hair day. The wind blows so much from the south that the trees grow bent toward the north. Glad I am not one of those trees!

I have to say that this beach experience was one of my favorite memories from the trip. And, to my knowledge, we didn't leave there with even a grain of black sand!

The next stop is the Kilauea Visitor Center in the park. I will save that for another day. For now, I will put my memories away so I can get on with my card for TTCRD.

As I said above, I chose the Under Bear image for this card. He's a silly cutie, don't you think? And I decided to use a sketch for this card, as I was in a hurry for a design. I chose this week's Sketch Saturday, so I will enter this card into their challenge:

I printed Under Bear on X-Press It CS and colored him with Copics: W2, W4, W6, W8, RV00, RV11, RV21. I added a bit of Copic Spica to his tail, heart, nose, and eyebrows for a little shine. I printed my Create with TLC sentiment on X-Press It also. Then I die-cut both the image and sentiment with Spellbinders Circle dies and sponged SU ink around their edges.

My DP is from Echo Park Love Story collection; it was paired with Stampin' Up CS. The other dies that I used on this card were Spellbinders Scalloped Circles, Lacey Circles, and Memory Box Madera Corner. I finished the card with some Queen & Co. Rhinestones.

I must away with myself now, so I can begin another card for another DT. Do check out the fabulous cards by my teammates. And I'll see you again for another installment of "As Penny's World Turns", AKA "Can She Bore Us Anymore--Is That Even Possible?"