Bunnies in the Berry Patch

Bunnies in the Berry Patch Necklace and Earring SetMostly when I have created jewelry and beaded accessories, I have created small things. Between all the hats of full-time and part-time work and caring for home and rabbits, small amounts of time to create things was what was available. I created this statement necklace and earring set last week. The design has been in my mind for a year now. Most of the materials for it have been here that long too. It was missing two things to make it a reality, time to really work on putting it together was a big factor. The final thing though was ordering some rings and a toggle clasp this fall that had a twist design. That was the last element needed to add to this design all the color and texture that I wanted it to have.

Even though we love having house rabbits, we also love our outdoor rabbits who hop all around our yard. They even come right up under our bay window bringing their babies with them to eat the tasty things amongst the grass. We have some wild strawberries that have grown threaded in through the grass by the back of the house.

Creating these pieces was a labor of love and exploration.  I wanted to spend more time creating a really wonderful rabbit statement necklace and earrings set. It makes me think of those outdoor rabbits finding and hopping into a winter berry patch loaded with goodies.  I wanted to share pictures of these here, because I love how beautifully the necklace and earrings came out.  I have wanted for some time to create a lovely rabbit statement piece or set.  I am always imagining rabbits getting in to all sorts of things and places.  I have a number of rabbit jewelry pieces I wear.  I love the idea of secretly sneaking rabbits in to places by carrying or wearing them with me as I travel around.

These two pieces contain materials I love working with: Sterling Silver, Swarovski Crystal beads and Czech glass beads. They also have the themes I love of rabbits, nature, flowers and leaves and rich colors. I loved how the garnet reds, olive greens, golden topaz and silver look together.

The sun is out here in Georgia on this day in the United States dedicated to giving thanks. I am thankful for wonderful things in my life. I have my loving supportive husband Blaine. We will be celebrating our 22nd anniversary this weekend. There was a wonderful decade of fun with our two rabbits Tigger and Shadow and just so many memories of them to treasure always. There is a new time now to get to know our sweet Leo the Lionhead rabbit and find out all his stories and be able to share those with others. I am thankful to have gifts to be able to share in helping others with bunny stories, web design and hosting and creative gifts with art and jeweled items.

I am my grandmother’s granddaughter. Mom says every picture of her mother she saw, grandmother was always the one wearing that extra little noticeable thing like another bow or piece of jewelry more than her sisters. I think grandmother and I both loved giving things including ourselves those extra special finishing touches, that cherry on the top feeling.

Have a lovely day today wherever in the world you are.  Give your loved ones hugs and pet those bunnies too to let them know they are appreciated and loved.

~ Rebecca Pullin

Whats Up With Rabbittude …

I have been MIA here for a while and it has been a combination of things.  The fall allergy season is a tricky one for me and sometimes leaves me drained and down or dealing with sleeplessness due to sinus pressure.  Next year, I need to get blog posts written ahead to make things easier on myself to keep on track.  However, this year was more than just seasonal allergies.  The end of the allergy season coincided with the six month anniversary of losing Tigger and Shadow.  That hit a bit harder than expected, especially so since one of our early friends we met after getting Tigger and Shadow was Jean and her bunny Acorn.  Acorn was also eleven years old and in failing health this past year.  I am sad to say that he too is now gone.  So I will get back to writing some stories soon and include a tribute to Acorn in that.

Leo has been keeping me company in the office on a daily basis and we are growing to know each other better.  He is a close to the vest bunny rabbit, not letting all his likes and dislikes and personality all hang out.  It will be an uncovering of the layers of Leo over time.  One thing though is quite clear, he is a sweetie and that makes it hard to understand how someone else could have given him up.

To keep my hands busy and still some sad thoughts for a time while still showing my love of rabbits, I have been doing a lot of creating with my hoard of bunny beads over this past couple months. Most of those items have been listed in our Etsy Buntique shop if you are looking for something rabbit themed for yourself or another rabbit lover. The showcase here has just a few of the items available.  We have a special going on starting tomorrow through next Monday, free US shipping and reduced shipping prices to locations outside the US.

I will start to write bunny stories again during this next week, now that things are getting back to normal again and I am catching up to schedule again.

Additions to Our New Page for International Rabbit Day

Rabbits Ready for International Rabbit DayThe Etsy Rabbits team has been even harder at work creating some really lovely treasuries in honor of International Rabbit Day coming soon on Saturday, September 22nd.  The number of treasuries on our new Events section page for 2012 International Rabbit Day page has doubled from 12 to 24!  The treasury pictured on the left has items from just 16 members of the Etsy Rabbits team.  The team currently has more than 300 rabbit loving members in countries around the world.

You can click on individual treasury images and will be taken to the treasury on Etsy so you can view all the lovely items larger.  Once you are over on the Etsy treasuries, you will be able to click on item images to be taken to the listing pages for the items if you want more info or to buy.

This is where I fess up.  I had planned a story on Portia for last Thursday and it was one of those weeks where I needed someone following me around reminding me what day it was.  So I blew it and completely lost track of time the end of last week and went off the calendar schedule.  I will have another story about Portia this Thursday …

New Events Section with New Page for International Rabbit Day

Falling For Rabbits by RabbittudeThe Etsy Rabbits team has been hard at work creating some really lovely treasuries in honor of International Rabbit Day coming soon on Saturday, September 22nd.  I started out trying to Tweet them as they came along, but they got a bit ahead of me.  So to catch up and allow an easy place for people to follow, I created a new Event section here on Rabbittude with a 2012 International Rabbit Day page showing all the treasuries created so far to get the word out about the day.  You can click on individual treasury images and will be taken to the treasury on Etsy so you can view all the lovely items larger.  Once you are over on the Etsy treasuries, you will be able to click on item images to be taken to the listing pages for the items if you want more info or to buy.

Enjoy!  I will have another story about Portia on Thursday …

Extra: Rabbits Always Ready to Surprise

After a combined 36 years in the lives of four rabbits, I am always learning there is much more to learn about bunnies. Leo appears to be susceptible to hiccups. I did not know that rabbits could have hiccups. I did some online research after his most recent attack and found a video of a rabbit experiencing hiccups and saw reports by many others of their rabbits experiencing hiccups:

Link to video if it isn’t working properly here: http://youtu.be/RSIkipInd28

I double checked with our vet today about when or if to be concerned. They said they would be want to see him if it starts happening everyday or if Leo seems distressed in some way or having breathing issues. So far it has occurred just twice with several weeks in between. Leo does not appear to be at all distressed, in fact he was laying down napping both times when he would just start making a funny noise and bouncing movement of his head. After no more than about a minute, it was gone again. It looked and sounded like hiccups, but took me completely by surprise because I had not seen or heard of hiccups before in a rabbit.

The vets staff recommended that if this happens again, we should try to capture it on video for the vet to take a look. That is a great suggestion for anyone with rabbits and weird symptoms since so often bringing them to the vet brings on such a fear response that even the sickest rabbit can often look quite healthy and normal when their systems kick into the fight or flight response of adrenaline flooding their systems. So Leo is giving us an extra added incentive to figure out how to have the video camera ready to catch him in action whatever that may be …

Tomorrow, the story of Shadow and parsley …

The Wonderful Pitty Pat of Bunny Paws Again

Little Leo hiding out in his sheet tunnel areaThere is light at the end of the tunnel as hormones are finally starting to fade a bit for my little bunny rabbit stalker. Leo the Lionhead has been sitting by or under my chair for a month now focused on my feet, just waiting for me to put one down on the floor so that he could pounce. Yesterday and today, the feel of his stare is finally being replaced by the sound of his paws as he is starting to hop around the room and find other things that interest him. Thank goodness! My feet and legs were really getting cramped trying to keep them up on the chair all the time while he was out.

Blaine and I are now looking forward to a time soon to see what Little Leo is like without hormones ruling him. It was really cute yesterday morning and this morning when he started and finished a couple speedy Bunny 500s around the office.  He began and ended them at my chair and seemed to be showing off for me. It has been so sweet to be able to get down on the floor a bit and interact with him without having to worry quite so much about getting love bites from those razor-sharp little teeth of his.

I am not sure what Leo did earlier today in his exercise pen area while I was working. I heard a splash and turned around to see a flood of water on the floor beside his water bowl.  Blaine thought he tried to take a swim, but I am quite puzzled because he seemed to be dry to the touch.  There wasn’t anything near the bowl that looked like he threw it in and the bowl is attached to the pen wall. I wonder if Leo tried to lift the pen and bounced the water out of the bowl?

Leo checking things outIt is going to be interesting to see what kind of Rabbittude Little Leo the Lion will be showing us now. Tigger & Shadow really kept us hopping enough that we didn’t have the opportunity to experiment much to capture them on video.  We will have to see if we can learn some bunny cam techniques with Leo.

Ah well … we aren’t completely out of the hormonal woods yet.  Gotta go, I had a leg down and Leo is trying for a close encounter.

On Thursday, the story of Shadow and parsley …

Rabbittude News Flash – Update

Daily News Extra! Extra!An upgrade to our Rabbittude website to bring the website and blog together has been in planning for quite some time.  We finally had the opportunity to do the behind the scenes work needed to make it a reality.  We are in the process of bringing it live right now.  Rabbittude.com won’t be available until the file uploading process is complete.

So the next post on our “Calico” bunny will be on Wednesday.  However, we will be moving things to a different web server during the next 24 hours.  That can sometimes cause browsers to have difficulty locating sites for 24 to 48 hours after the move.  Have no fear if Rabbittude.com or the blog disappear, they will show back up again once all the browsers update for the new location.

After the move, you will be able to find the blog on Rabbittude.com or if you have bookmarked blog.rabbittude.com as a favorite, that web address will be programmed to go to the new blog location.  We know we will have some sorting out issues for a short time to and hope to keep those to a minimum.

We have completed moving everything over and combining our website and blog together.  We are still working through a few wrinkles.  It does not look like we have the ability to import current subscribers or followers.  If you were previously subscribed to receive new posts via email, you will need to use the subscribe link on the right to subscribe here.  So sorry all for the inconvenience of having to re subscribe /  re follow!

Memories …

Black and white of Shadow & TiggerOur Tigger and Shadow passed away yesterday morning. Tigger had reached eleven years old at the beginning of March. Shadow just turned eleven near the end of April.

The vet had told us months ago that they were considered to be in hospice care.  The plan was to work together to treat them with care to keep them as comfortable, pain-free and happy as possible. I have not been talking about the process over the past few months.  I thought I could, but then found I could not because emotions can be raw some days watching the obvious evidence that death is approaching and claiming them by degrees.

They turned a corner where we realized that we could allow them to linger on in pain and fear, struggling badly trying to keep doing all the things they were used to doing and still wanted to do.  With all our love and help, we could not give them what they wanted most which was a return to running, jumping and playing with abandon.  Even while growing deathly ill, they would use every bit of adrenaline they could muster to get up and run even with stumbling sideways steps or bumping in to things.  Tigger grew very fearful of all but Shadow.  We made the hard choice to assist them one last time to a place where they would be free of the struggles, pain and fear.  When we took them in to the vet for the final time, she said we had gone much longer being able to assist them than she had expected.

They passed away within minutes of each other snuggled together as Blaine and I petted them and told them how much we loved them.  I have always loved the saying, “When someone you love becomes a memory, the memory becomes a treasure.”  We have the most beautiful memories of the more than ten years we spent with them.

We are so sad right now, but there is a new beginning from this passage.  While they were living, we took all the time we could to enjoy hopping along on their journey.  There were so many stories I wanted to share and write, but never enough time. 

Four little rabbits came into my life, each was a joy, but each had a unique personality.  Many don’t realize just how personable and fun a rabbit can be to interact with on a day-to-day basis.  I want to share their stories to preserve them well in our memories but also for others to learn what a joy it can be to have a rabbit as a companion animal.

  • We brought Tigger home in May eleven years ago.  I will write her tales in May and June
  • Shadow came to us in July, so I will write his stories in July and August
  • Portia came to us in September, so I will share about her  in September and October
  • Then there is one more bunny, Thumper, the first house rabbit I ever came to know oh so long ago now.  I will write about him in November and December

Along the way there will be pictures and artwork to celebrate them all.  There are so many things I have always wanted to create from having come to know them, but not enough time to do it while they were with us.  I also hope to put together some things that will assist others in having a long and lovely relationship with a house rabbit (rabbits – it is hard to have just one!).

Blaine and I will a take a bit of time by ourselves this week.  Then I will reach out again starting next week with the story of how a Tigger came to join our family.

Freaky Friday Instead of Follow Friday

Question marksJust a quick post here as today went really freaky midway through and I have been trying to get back on course ever since.  It was a beautiful fall day, not too hot, not too cold.  The skies were blue, the sun was shining and then the tornado sirens went off  and continued to go off ???

Normally they test them the first Wednesday of each month at noon, so not a normal test day, no bad weather to be seen ???  When I checked weather.com, it showed an alert had just been released for our area warning of high risk for fires.  So were they trying to alert us to that ???  There was no smoke to be seen and no smell of fire in the air.

So I called 911, twice and twice my phone service told me the number was not a working number ???  So I am starting to freak out as the sirens are still going off and I have no idea what is going on.  I’m trying and failing to find the full phone number for the police department.  So I phone the hubby and ask him to find the number and call the police for info while I head back to check outside again.

Hubby called back a few minutes later.  He had reached the police who had answered the phone, saying “We don’t know why they are going off either” and then hung up.  He said they sounded quite frazzled.  So best guess is that someone saw the National Weather Service alert about the fire warning and turned on the sirens, leaving everyone including the authorities scrambling but clueless as to what was wrong.

Oh and the bunnies were taking their usual afternoon nap in their cages and weren’t bothered by it at all. 

Slight Delay …

🙁 As happens with humans, the fluid congestion from Shadow’s allergies has led to a slight infection.  We have been giving him Benadryl (in vet determined dose) to try to cut down the sneezing and congestion.  There must have still been a bit too much sitting around in his sinuses and he started to have some thick nasal mucus last evening.  So he got a trip to the vet first thing this morning.

Stay tuned! Tomorrow I will have the promised Etsy treasury full of items from some of our international Etsy Rabbits to lead off a total of six treasuries I will do showcasing one item each from the active Etsy Rabbits shops.  A few shops are currently on vacation or hiatus, but there are currently almost 100 shops from over a dozen different countries. 

There are so many wonderful items available from the Etsy Rabbits with a variety of  styles in art, crafts, jewelry, accessories, clothing, home decor and more …