Elephant Appreciation Day

Over at ARTastic Challenges their current challenge is "quirky and fun". Now this did stump me for awhile. So off to do research I went.  First I looked up quirky and found the following definition "having or full of quirks",  not much help there.  So I looked for words that would describe quirky and came up with far-out, kinky, off-beat, way-out, odd, bizarre, off-the-wall, peculiar, strange, unconventional, unusual, wacky and weird. Okay, feeling more inspired.
Next, the word bizarre kept jumping around in my head - then why not bizarre holidays in September. So off to I went to research bizarre holidays in September.  2nd September National Beheading Day - I think not!!!  22nd September Elephant Appreciation Day.  Appropriate as I had photos from a trip to San Diego Zoo in November 2012 yet to be scrapped.
Again back to Google this time I typed in words to describe elephants and found the words above that I printed onto Grey cardstock together with my title.   I ran my black stamp pad around the edges of all the papers.  That fun Bo Bunny elephant standing on the title is quirky in his/her own way. Some Candi Hardware dots and ribbon I found during my holiday in US complete the layout.  I had fun completing this layout and stretching my brain into the researching the topic.

The postcard I purchased at the Zoo and it is full of elephant facts. Did you know?

• An elephant's skin is so sensitive that it can feel a fly landing on it.
• Elephants use their trunks to drink but the water does not go all the way up the trunk like a straw. Instead, the elephant sucks water part of the way up the trunk, curls it toward its mouth, tilts its head up, and lets the water pour in.
• The low, resounding calls elephants make can be heard by another elephant up to 5 miles (8km) away.
• Elephants have been relentlessly hunted for their tusks, even though the tusks are made of dentine - the same as our teeth!

Finally, I would like to recommend a book that I read last year - The Elephant Whisperer by Lawrence Anthony.  Learning about love, loyalty and freedom from a herd of wild elephants.  A great read.
Another book I have read with elephants as the main theme would have to be Like Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen.

So on 22nd September this year and every year that follows remember to appreciate the elephant.... Thank you for looking today.   Margaret