What the Caterpillar Calls the End of the World...

What the caterpillar calls the end of the world, the Master calls a butterfly.. -Richard Bach

I adore Richard Bach. He wrote one of my favorite books of my childhood, Jonathan Livingston Seagull. I loved anthropomorphic books like this and Pagoo. Having been a Dr. Doolittle type all my life, I know that life is precious, and all little creatures have feelings and personalities and different forms of expression that we should recognize and try to understand.

I saw a great story about some Lassie-style dolphins that saved a Doberman's life in Florida a few weeks ago - you can read about it here. Dolphins clearly have empathy, feel stress and have an understanding of danger to another species, sweet little animals.

If you've been watching the news this week, you've probably felt that same empathy and stress and fear and desire to help. The world gets smaller at moments like this and reminds us how little we are.

But it also reminds of how generous and kind and strong people can be. I'm sure in the coming days we will hear stories that will amaze us.

When I saw Eva's butterfly challenge, I thought - now here's a great artistic coincidence... There's no image better suited to illustrate hope than our little winged, transformy friends!
So I took out a Japanese book I found last year at Half Price Books, and rubbed Ballet Blue ink onto my Beautiful Wings Embosslit and zipped it through the Big Shot. I actually did two pages at the same time since they are so much thinner than cardstock, so now I have tons of pretty, printy butterflies. I love how each of the butterflies has a different pattern embossed on it.

I brayered another page with Summer Sun Ink for the background, and made the greeting with the sneak peek set - Four Frames - and the Decorative Label Punch. The greeting is from Voeux mignons.

I hope our friends in Japan can feel the butterfly effect of the thoughts and prayers of millions of people on our side of the Pacific.