My ARTistic Life

Weekly Art Challenge & ARTchix Specials

Weekly Art Challenge: Celebrate Paris!

Oh, how I love Paris! For this challenge, make a collage celebrating this beautiful city! Think about what you'd do there: shopping, seeing art, lounging in cafes, touring the Eiffel Tower, etc... and make a piece of art honoring the fun things to do and see in Paris.

I made this fun ATC envisioning a girls trip to Paris someday. We would drink champagne, see lots of gorgeous art and collect wonderful treasures at the flea markets.

I am entering this ATC into our current YahooGroup ATC Lottery which has a "fantasy" theme. There's still time for you to play if you'd like. You just need to make an ATC with one of your fantasies (and at least one ARTchix product) and post it to our YahooGroup by March 29th. You could win my ATC above along with lots of other gorgeous ATCs made by our YahooGroup artists.

I used several ARTchix products in my ATC: Happy Chix collage sheet, Trip to France collage sheet (our Weekly Special), Gold French Borders, Tell Me a Story and Tell Me Another Story collage sheet and our Watercolor ATCs.

How to play in this art challenge: Make a collage of any size or shape celebrating the city of Paris. Then scan and post it to your blog, flickr account or website. Next, click on "comment" at the bottom of this post and leave a note with a link to your art challenge post so I know where to see it online. In addition, please link back to my blog.

If you don't have a website or blog or anything, feel free to email me your submission with "Blog Art Challenge" as your subject line. (helga@artchixstudio.com)

Deadline: Tuesday morning, April 7, 2009.

Prize: I will pick my favorites from those entered in this challenge...and the winners will receive fun Paris -themed goodie bags. I will announce the winners on Wed, April 8.

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ARTchix Bonus Gift of the Week: "Paris" Inchie Stickers!

For these 2 weeks, type "spoil me" in the comments section of your order and we will include this awesome set of Paris- themed inchie stickers with your order.(#13 in our blog sticker series).

Or order our blog special below and we will automatically include this bonus gift. Hooray!

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Surprise Bonus Gift:
See the cute pink fuzzy chick on the top of Lenna's computer? We're tucking these adorable little pink chicks into our orders that are packaged in boxes. So, ya never know, you may be surprised with one of these cuties!

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ARTchix Special of the Week: Trip to France collage sheet:

Get this fantastic collage sheet for half price for these 2 weeks only! Go to this special link to purchase it. Get it and play in our upcoming art swap: "Paris" Bookmarks!

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Hooray for Jackie!

Here in ARTchix-land, Jackie McColl makes sure that your ARTchix orders are perfect along with a million other things. We are so lucky to have her! Jackie is also an amazing artist! Now you can see her gorgeous artwork on Flickr! Hooray!

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Upcoming Schedule:

Wed, April 1: I'll pop in for a quick post with just your Weekly Dose of Cuteness.

Wed, April 8: I'll be back with the winners of our Paris Art Challenge along with your Weekly Dose of Cuteness, ARTchix specials, a new Art Challenge and MORE! : )

Cuteness, Winner & Our Featured Artist

ARTchix Studio's Featured Artist: Kimberly Moore

The wonderful Kimberly Moore is our current Featured Artist. Look at these gorgeous ATCs that she just emailed me! Love them! Both ATCs include gorgeous gals from our Sassy Style collage sheet along with greenery from our Spring Blossom collage sheet. In addition, the diva on the right is sporting a hat from our Chixies Hat Affair collage sheet along with flowers from our Floral Fantasy collage sheet.
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Weekly Dose of Cuteness: Baby Uma

Looking at the puppy photos of Stella last week got me looking at kitten photos too! Look at this cute one of little Uma as a kitten. Such a cutie!
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Winner of our Last Art Challenge: Get Inspired by Art in Your Home!

I received 6 fun entries to this exciting challenge of getting inspiration from your home. I struggled with picking a winner but in the end, I just had to pick...

SUE CERVANTEZ! Sue made the beautiful collage on the right after being inspired by her son's painting (that he painted when he was in 2nd grade) of the Hale Bopp Comet on the left. I love her use of colors and symbols and the story behind it. So wonderful!

And even though ARTchix products aren't required to play in my weekly art challenges, I can't resist pointing out that wow, she used a lot of our gorgeous products in her piece:
Mystical transparency sheet
Red Hot Collage sheet
Chixies Spoil Me Collage collection
Tangerine Travels Collage sheet
Chixies Hat Affair Collage sheet
Art Blast Collage sheet
Chixies Winter Post
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Sue's Prize:

I had a fun time putting together this fun goodie bag for Sue. You can see that I included a fun tag with a big "C is for congrats" that I bought on etsy along with cute paper flowers that I bought on etsy too. Also, some Frida Kahlo stickers and sweet butterfly images.

Weekly Art Challenge & ARTchix Specials

Weekly Art Challenge: Get Inspired by Art in Your Home!

For this week, look around your home and find a piece of artwork that inspires you. I picked this cool cherry painting that I bought in Mexico. I love how it's simple, beautiful and fun all at the same time.

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Now, make something! After studying my cherry painting from Mexico, I decided to make a grid of little squares and play with putting images inside them. I tried to include only the top third of each image (similar to the cherry painting) and I kept the backgrounds really simple. I tried to go stark white like the cherry painting but just couldn't do it. lol. So, instead, I glued down some vintage text and painted some white gesso on top. On some of the squares, I added a bit of watercolor crayon to give them a bit of a green and orange tint. This was a really fun challenge!

In this piece, you'll find images from: My Art Challenges sheet, Women in Art sheet, Art Blast sheet (Note: this is the weekly special), E is for Egg sheet, Good Kitty sheet, Dreaming in White sheet and all of the words are from Tell Me Another Story.

How to play in this art challenge: Take a photo of a piece of artwork in your home that inspires you. Then make a collage or anything you'd like that is inspired by this piece. Be sure to include a photo of your art inspiration along with the art that you create.

OR if you're loving my cherry painting, feel free to make a piece of art inspired by it.

Then scan and post it to your blog, flickr account or website. Next, click on "comment" at the bottom of this post and leave a note with a link to your art challenge post so I know where to see it online. In addition, please link back to my blog.

If you don't have a website or blog or anything, feel free to email me your submission with "Blog Art Challenge" as your subject line. (helga@artchixstudio.com)

Deadline: Tuesday morning, March 24, 2009.

Prize: I will pick my favorite from those entered in this challenge...and the winner will receive a fun goodie bag. I will announce the winner on Wed, March 25.

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ARTchix Bonus Gift of the Week: Inchie Stickers!

For this week, type "spoil me" in the comments section of your order and we will include this awesome set of inchie stickers with your order.(#12 in our blog sticker series).

Or order our blog special below and we will automatically include this bonus gift. Hooray!

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ARTchix Special of the Week: Art Blast collage sheet:

Get this stunning collage sheet for half price for this week only! Go to this special link to purchase it. Get it and play in our upcoming art swap: "Art Blast" ATCs!

Inspiration, Winners & Puppy Stella!

Inspired by Our Art Blast Playing Cards

Last month, Clarissa Sharp and Christy Laudig won one of my Weekly Art Challenges. I sent them each a fun goodie bag and tucked inside was one of our new Art Blast Playing Cards. I asked them to make something that was inspired by the card that I sent them. Here's what they made:

Christy received the pretty playing card on the left. She was inspired to make this awesome clip board after studying it. Isn't it lovely?! She has used a smiling woman image from our Sepia Gals collage sheet, a pink heart from our Art Blast collage sheet, faux post from our Poste d'Amour, pink ephemera from our Passion for Pink collage sheet, and a bit of our Pink Floral Borders. Wow!

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Clarissa received the neat bird playing card on the left. She was inspired to make this beautiful bird collage after seeing it. You can find a pink bird from our Pink Symbols and a bit of Tiny Pink Dot Border.
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Weekly Dose of Cuteness: Puppy Stella!

After snuggling with puppy Finnbar recently, I had to go through our puppy photos of Stella. Wasn't she so fluffy and adorable?!
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Winners of our Last Art Challenge (Play with Purple, Yellow and Green!)

I received 13 gorgeous entries filled with bright purple, green and yellow! It was way too hard to pick just one winner so I picked four! And here they are:

LENNA ANDREWS! I loved her use of color and what's that I see?! Why, she altered one of our Art Blast Playing Cards! How cool is that?! She also included "She rocks" from Her Words collage sheet and a purple door from our Dazzling Doorways collage sheet. Awesome!

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PEGGY GATTO! Isn't this piece FUN?! I love how Peggy has put our cute gal from the Chixies Bubbles Collection riding in a big shoe....along with her great quote. Too funny!

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SANDEE HYDE! I'm a sucker for everything with mermaids! lol. I just love this collage! Love how Sandee has played with the mermaid's tail (from our Sirens of the Sea sheet).

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SUE CERVANTEZ! This collage is soooo lovely! I love the Chixie Hat on top of the cute gal. And love how she's stamped up the pretty background from our Green World collage sheet. And my, how that bird from the Hellow Yellow sheet shines!

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Prizes for the Winners:

Fabulous mini goodie bags! You can see here that they include Happy Chix, Chixies Art Flourishes faux post, tickets, background papers and more!

New Art Challenge, Special and Fluffy Chicks!

New Weekly Art Challenge: Play with Purple, Yellow and Green!

For this week, dig out your art supplies and focus on papers and paints that are purple, yellow and green. I recently played with this color combination when I made these ATCs for our Art Flourishes swap. I was pleasantly surprised by how well they looked together.
In these 2 ATCs, you'll find images from our Hats in Bloom collage sheet (our blog special this week), Art Flourishes collage sheet (that I hand colored with felt tip pens), Butterfly Butterfly collage sheet, Tell Me a Story collage sheet and Tiny Pink Dot Borders (that I aged with alcohol inks).

How to play in this art challenge: Make a collage of any size or shape featuring the colors: purple, yellow and green. 

Then scan and post it to your blog, flickr account or website. Next, click on "comment" at the bottom of this post and leave a note with a link to your art challenge post so I know where to see it online. In addition, please link back to my blog.

If you don't have a website or blog or anything, feel free to email me your submission with "Blog Art Challenge" as your subject line. (helga@artchixstudio.com)

Deadline: Tuesday morning, March 17, 2009.

Prize: I will pick my favorite from those entered in this challenge...and the winner will receive a fun goodie bag. I will announce the winner on Wed, March 18.

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ARTchix Blog Special of the Week: Our Hats in Bloom Collage Sheet

This is one of my favorite collage sheets! These gorgeous gals and their blooming hats make me smile and they look great on everything! Get this fantastic sheet for half price for this week only! Follow this special link to purchase it!
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INSPIRATION with Hats in Bloom by Cindy McMath:

Don't you just LOVE these funny ATCs that Cindy made?! She paired our Hats in Bloom with our Art Bingo collage sheet!

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Get 2 Free Gifts Today!

We're in the process of celebrating our fabulous new products on our website! Hooray! So, order today and get 2 free gifts:

GIFT #1: Order today and get this awesome new free gift that I just designed!

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GIFT #2: If your order is over $25 (before shipping), we'll tuck in these awesome stickers of cute chicks and more! Offer good while supplies last so get 'em while you can! : )

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BIG GIFT #2: Guess what?! If your order is over $100 (before shipping), we will add this delightful fun-packed gift to your order! It includes cute chick stickers, a fluffy pink chick, colorful tags by Helga and more! Offer good while supplies last so get 'em while you can! : )

New Swap, Cuteness, Winners & Paper Dolls!

NEW Art Swap: "Paris" Bookmarks!

Join me in celebrating one of the most beautiful cities in the world! Paris holds such a special place in my heart. Don't ya think it would be so wonderful to have a set of special arty bookmarks devoted to dear Paris?

I made this fun bookmark in minutes by simply gluing images from our new Inchie World collage sheet to one of our Watercolor Bookmarks. Then I added the Eiffel Tower "hat" and cute chick from our new Trip to France collage sheet. Lastly, I added purple rhinestones and "I love Paris" cut out from our new Tell Me Another Story collage sheet.

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ARTchix Paper Dolls in the new issue of Somerset Studio!

Our talented guest designer, Alwen Rambo, was recently published in Somerset Studio with her fabulous paper dolls! Hooray! Don't miss our new Pretty Paper Dolls collage sheet that she designed in honor of it!

Can you guess how many ARTchix products Alwen used in her paper dolls?! Neither can we, lol! Here they are: Glamour Faux Post, Whimsical Wings, Butterfly Butterfly, Silver Hand Charms, Spring Blossom, Royal Faux Post, Copper Hand Charms and Minstrel Shoes!

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Weekly Dose of Cuteness

Welcome adorable Finnbar! He's the newest addition to our ARTchix family! Cynthia, our packaging diva, just brought him home. Couldn't resist sharing this photo with you!

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Winners of our Last Art Challenge: Have a Cup of Tea & Make a Collage With the Packaging!

We had 13 gorgeous entries for this last art challenge. I thoroughly enjoyed receiving your submissions via email and online. I loved seeing all of the tea packaging transformed into lovely works of art! I think it's extra cool when you can transform "trash" into treasure! Everything was so fantastic that I couldn't pick just one winner...so I picked 3! : )

BARB MALTY! Dont' ya just love all of the layers and bright colors?!
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MIKEL OBRIEN! Isn't this piece lovely? Mikel used the same tea packaging as Barb's yet they both have such a unique style. Love 'em!
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JENNIFER ROGERS DANIELS! Jennifer made 3 beautiful ATCs, this happens to be my favorite!
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Congratulations Barb, Mikel & Jennifer! Here's the fun goodie bag that I put together for you! You can see a hint of what it includes in this photo: stickers with my tea packaging artwork, Gold Embellishment Frame, White Wings, hand from Handful of Treasure, image from Sweet Spring and more. Enjoy! : )

Weekly Art Challenge & ARTchix Specials

Weekly Art Challenge: Have a Cup of Tea & Make a Collage With the Packaging!

For this week, enjoy a wonderful cup of hot tea and save the packaging! I could go on and on about my love for tea. I usually drink at least 2 steaming mugs of tea everyday. Since July of last year, I have been on a quest to lose weight and get fit. So far, I've lost over 50 pounds and I must say that drinking tea has helped to keep me warm, happy and satisfied. My favorite tea of all time: Celestial Seasonings Bengal Spice. This is the box it comes in:

After you drink your yummy tea, make a collage out of the packaging. Here's what I made:

Don't you just LOVE this tiger from the tea packaging?! I put him on this ATC and added images from the Spring Blossom collage sheet (our blog special this week) that I colored with watercolor crayons to give them a brighter, richer hue. I also added polka dots with a pink Souffle pen by Sakura (great pens!). "Embrace the Earth" is from our new collage sheet: Tell Me Another Story (which will be available on our website next Wed).

How to play in this art challenge: Enjoy a cup of tea and then make a collage out of the packaging. 

Then scan and post it to your blog, flickr account or website. Next, click on "comment" at the bottom of this post and leave a note with a link to your art challenge post so I know where to see it online.

If you don't have a website or blog or anything, feel free to email me your submission with "Blog Art Challenge" as your subject line. (helga@artchixstudio.com)

Deadline: Tuesday morning, March 10, 2009.

Prize: I will pick my favorite from those entered in this challenge...and the winner will receive a fun goodie bag. I will announce the winner on Wed, March 11.

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ARTchix Bonus Gift of the Week (Mar 4 - 11):

For this week, type "spoil me" in the comments section of your order and we will include this awesome set of mini stickers with your order.(#11 in our blog sticker series).

Or order our blog special below and we will automatically include this bonus gift. Hooray!

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ARTchix Special of the Week: Spring Blossom collage sheet and/or transparency sheet:

Get this gorgeous collage sheet and/ or transparency for half price for this week only! Go to this special link to purchase it. Play in our upcoming swap: "Art Blast" ATCs with this collage or transparency sheet!

Spring Blossom - INSPIRATION by Laura Carson:

Aren't these ATCs just gorgeous?! Laura used the Spring Blossom collage sheet in the background and added micro beads to the flowers to bring them to life. She has also included a strip of our Medieval Borders on the bottom of each ATC. Wow, these are just stunning!

See you next week for more fun and creativity! : )

Flourishes Swap Winners, Art Challenge Winners & Your Weekly Dose of Cuteness

WINNERS of the Last Art Challenge (Have an adventure day & celebrate it with a collage!)
It was so wonderful seeing so many of you treat yourself to fun art adventure days! We had 11 participants in this fun art challenge and I had such a hard time picking one winner that I decided to pick 3 winners instead! Yay! Here they are:

SUE YOUNG! Sue went to the Art Institute of Chicago for an Edvard Munch exhibit. She says: "What a surprising exhibit...we learned much about Munch and his contemporaries. Munch is best known,of course,for his black and white painting called "The Scream". I hadn't really planned on entering this week's Artchix contest until I saw this painting in person. Immediately, I knew what I HAD to do!!!
It's called "Life With/Without ArtChix". You'll notice that life without ArtChix is colorless, bleak, sad; definitely worth screaming bloody murder!!! Life WITH ArtChix is colorful, brilliant, creative and exciting!"

Sue's piece really touched me and made me feel so proud, happy and honored!

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JAN DEBELLIS! Jan went to Red Canyon Park in Colorado and made this wonderful collage to celebrate her great time there. Note: she also used my photo from Vancouver in this piece, looks fab! : )

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AMY PAINTER! Amy went to Point Roberts, took tons of cool photos and transformed them into an amazing altered book!

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Congratulations Sue, Jan and Amy! You will each receive this little goodie bag with pretty samples from my shopping trip in Vancouver:

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WINNERS of our Art Flourishes Swap
Recently, we hosted a fantastic Artist Trading Card Swap. All participants were asked to make 6 ATCs using our Art Flourishes collage sheet or transparency. I was amazed at all of the incredible ATCs that came in the mail! Wow, such inspiration! I ended up picking 1 Winner and 5 Honorable Mentions! The Winner received a $100 shopping spree at ARTchix Studio. And the Honorable Mentions received fabulous spring-themed ARTchix goodie bags. And here they are:

The WINNER: Cristal Marie Wooten
My favorite ARTchix product at the moment: I love the collage sheet collection, and the german scrap.
My inspiration and techniques used in my flourish ATCs: I gathered a whole bunch of "stuff" together including tons of ARTchix products and spread it out and then over the next few days added bits and pieces untill they felt complete. I also tried some new techniques on some of them. I used Utee and cracked it to achieve a shiny cracked effect. These were a lot of fun!

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HONORABLE MENTION: Becky Loyall
My favorite Artchix product at the moment: Victorian Colorful Butterflies. I love to make faeries and am having a blast with these on my ACEO's.
My inspiration used in my flourish ATCs: I love nature and everything about it! I wanted to use some vintage photos from the great Silent film era. So each one of my cards has an actress from that time and flowers. I see them as helping our modern cinema bloom into what it has become. I also wanted to convey that artwork blooms and changes daily in my head anyway! The flourishes added the final touch!
My technique: After I made my collages, I coated each card with Judikins Diamond Glaze, then I added the flourish transparencies and when they dried, I coated them again with Diamond Glaze.

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HONORABLE MENTION: Belinda Schneider

My favorite ARTchix product at the moment: Spoil Me collage sheet
My inspiration and techniques used in my flourish ATCs:  I paged thru a few magazines and found these images. The background is layers of acrylic paint. The design was inspired by the flourishes which I just love.

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HONORABLE MENTION: Linda Riegelsberger
My favorite ARTchix product at the moment: Glamour Post Faux Postage
My inspiration and techniques used in my flourish ATCs:  Both the mermaid and dancing puppet were done on shrink plastic.  The embossed dots were done with Liquid Pearls.  I wanted to represent movement and action in both of these pieces, so I made the people "doing" something.  The puppet is wearing the flourish head-piece like a Vegas showgirl, and I thought the painted face from the flourish sheet fitted well with that theme.  The mermaid is picking jewels off the curly flourishes that I thought looked like seaweed.

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HONORABLE MENTION: Norma Skoglund
My favorite ARTchix product at the moment: Dapper Fellows collage sheet. They all look so stearn that it is easy to poke fun at them just a little.
My inspiration used in my flourish ATCs:  I put all the cut pieces from my collage sheets on a tray and transparencies on another tray, then just start moving them around and trying different combinations. Then I make or find a background that I like with the arrangement. The "Winged Beauties" just seemed to be perfect for this challenge.
My techniques: On the flourishes, I used Lumiere paints for some of the backgrounds, a few rubber stamps, Copic markers, and Stckles for a little sparkle. (I always like a little bling!) Most of the transparencies were adhered with glue dots.

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HONORABLE MENTION: Teri Calia
My favorite ARTchix product at the moment: Winged Nudies collage sheet
My inspiration and techniques used in my flourish ATCs:  I was inspired by the wonderful images on the Women in Art collage sheet. The women have such wonderful expressions, I just had to give them crazy hats to frame them.

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COMING NEXT WED, March 11:

The Chixies Art Flourishes Sticker Collection will be for sale on our website next Wednesday! 4 sheets of gorgeous stickers to decorate your world, you're going to love them!
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WEEKLY DOSE OF CUTENESS

My adorable kitty Inca! She loves to sleep on her back like this! Doesn't she look so cute? You can see her smiling in this pic! : )