God Save The King!
And his kingdom!
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"One of the advantages of being disorderly is that one is constantly making exciting discoveries." - A.A. Milne
^,^ A little extra fun for this one. October birthdays are the best, and International Snow Leopard Day is coming up, so he just couldn't be left out. ^_~
I didn't intend to, just drew something fun, but with the two male lions together it's a good time to talk about male lion coalitions. Young male lions get ousted from their birth prides when they reach sexual maturity. This prevents inbreeding and spreads genes around. Brothers and cousins often stick together as they go off to make their way in the world, forming a "coalition". Though, male lions that have never met before may also come together into a coalition. Seems like the usual number together is two to four, but it varies. Sticking together gives them a better chance of taking over and protecting their own pride. ...like from non-native species smart alecks... ^,^
Wahoo! ^_^ A few more great days last week. There were TWO great egrets at the reservoir, and they were fishing near one of the blue herons. ^_^
And, I finally got a shot of a heron in flight. YAY! ^_^ I've always loved seeing them take off: Skinny stick of a bird, then *whoosh* pteradactyl. I call them "herondactyl"s. ^_^
There's a couple of photos at the bottom of the page with the swan and blue heron together, as well as the swan and great egret together. They're both good-sized birds, but the herons are very slight in comparison.
I got a few nice clear shots of the swan - and the ducks, finally! I could never get close to the very shy ducks, but I guess the swan's presence made them feel more secure. Notice how they kept him distinctly between us. ^.^
You can learn more about swans at Trumpeter Swan Society, which mentions about how they get brown heads.
That swan is so funny. ^,^ I thought he was sleeping as I sat and merrily took my time to get the phone and binoculars to line up and focus for a nice crisp shot. It wasn't until I got home and saw it bigger on the computer that I noticed his little eye watching me watching him. ^o^ And here I'd thought I'd been so clever by using the binoculars instead of walking closer... ^.^
You may notice the swan's head is now brown. I wondered about it, so looked it up and found out that iron-rich water will stain the heads of white bottom-feeder birds. It's not a seasonal color change. Unlike birds like herons, which just dart their heads underwater for a moment, bottom-feeders have their heads underwater for long periods of time, and we have a lot of iron-rich water in our region. You may have seen rusty stains in sinks or toilets. With the reservoir's water level so low, it's more concentrated there now.
Well, the interference isn't going away, and constantly fighting a bad signal is exhausting and not conducive to a fun mood. You gotta' pick your battles. I've linked to plenty of sites already that you can explore for information on whatever I post about, so this is the last post with specific links for awhile. Rather than getting frustrated with bad signal, I'm just going to focus on drawing and getting them uploaded, and try to check email once in awhile.
This week is an almost psychedelic zebra theme. ^_^ There are three main species, with two already endangered and numbers significantly declining in the other one.
You can learn more about them at Africa Wildlife Detective , NatGeo Kids and Kruger Park.
I've also added spotted-heart versions to the hyena, cheetah, giraffe and leopard cards on the July-Sept page.
Halloween is a great time for bats. ^_^ I'm posting early so if you want to send it to anyone for Halloween, you have time. There's a lot of urban myths about bats, but in reality they're our biggest source of insect control and one of the most beneficial animals to humans. I remember reading somewhere that around 200 species of them around the world are threatened. There are really big species in Africa, but most bats are like the herons: They look bigger when their wings are extended, but actually have small bodies. The brown bats around here look big when flying around your ceiling, but are cute and tiny when perched.
I don't have links for endangered African bats, but I do have some I got before about PA bats. You can encourage them to roost on your property - or give them an alternative to roosting in your attic, by building them a bat box. PennState has great info on local bats, including when bats are inside your house and on building houses for them. PA Game Commission has plans for a small bat house with 80 bats capacity - and a large one page 1 , page 2, with 250 bats capacity. You can use multiple bat boxes near each other.
Decided to try a connect-the-dots picture. They're hard to make with fewer numbers, and I ended up having to go to 35; but it shouldn't be too hard to follow. If you can count to ten, I'm confident you can do this page. Each time you come to a zero, just keep following the 1-2-3 order. ^_^
If you need help remembering what the revealed behaviour is called, you can refer to page 171.
*sigh* I miss being able to be online. ;_; There's still just too much interference, and I'm lucky I can even get connected well enough to get new coloring pages to upload - and that often takes a few tries to get them through. I've been in the dark even about the Sanctuary for almost a month now. ;_; I'm not afraid of the dark, but I miss all those bright sunshiny faces. >^_^<
I remember doing pictures like this in school and decided to try a lion. I think it came out pretty well. ^_^ You can try it, too. All you do is use words instead of drawing lines. When drawing more complicated figures, it helps to draw the picture lightly in pencil and then write your words along the lines of that - in pencil, too, in case you want to rearrange them. Then, you can go over the words with pen or marker and erase the pencil marks. Use whatever words you like. I remember just repeating color words or shape words when I was little, but this time I used some phrases.
This maze is through a picture based off of a photo of George and Yame.
You can learn more about them in the Cub Petting section, which has links to Sanctuary videos featuring them.
When so much has been taken away and people keep shoving an inability in your face, it's hard to be in a thankful mood; but this Thanksgiving season I am thankful for God putting the KRWSanctuary on my heart and inspiring my creativity to new heights. Even though the destination is right where I started from, I'm thankful for having been able to share this journey and have loved every moment of it. Happy Thanksgiving.
Like the pop-up card crafts, I try to keep mazes simple enough that visitors of any age can do them.
Painted wolves are perfect for making mazes out of. ^_^ And they have nice autumn colors, so I had this page in mind for Thanksgiving awhile ago. ^_^ If you're new, they're also commonly called painted dogs and there are only less than 7,500 left in the wild. That's half of the number of remaining wild lions.
When I was making those recent pop-up cards, a Christmas one came out, too. It was hard to wait to post it. ^_^
Check out other Christmas cards and Christmas-themed pages linked through that section.
An often misquoted, or misused, reference, especially around Christmas, is about "the lion and the lamb". There is no Bible verse that says, "the lion shall lie down with the lamb". The actual Bible verse is: "The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and the little child shall lead them." - Isaiah 11:6
In "lion and lamb" references, the lion represents God, and the lamb represents Jesus, the lamb of God who was sacrificed for our sins. Christmas is about the birth of that lamb. ~ It's gotten way too commercialized, and my mom and I liked to say, "It's Jesus' birthday - not ours." When sending Christmas cards, she even liked to use the Happy Birthday postage stamps and write Jesus under them for "Happy Birthday Jesus". ^_^ - which may be the translation of "Happy Christmas" that some cultures use instead of "Merry" Christmas, as Christmas means "Christ's birth". ^_^
I had been trying to think of activities or games that can be printed out, and which I could customize, and decided to do a LION version of the BINGO game. Then, I decided to save it 'til now to keep you busy over Christmas vacation. ^_^
I made two versions: one with pictures on the game board, and one with words for a different challenge or to help those learning the words to practice. They'll be more durable if you can print them out on cardstock, or cut half of a folder to paper size and print on that.
printable page 208 word gameboard ~ picture gameboard
I also made a BINGO game with African animals and also saved it to keep you busy over Christmas vacation. ^_~ This game is also in two versions, with one matching picture to picture and one matching picture to word. I couldn't fit this one all on one page, so the gameboards and game pieces are on separate pages to print.
For multiple players, if you use buttons or something as markers, you should only need one sheet of game pieces. However, if each player keeps the piece that's drawn to place on their gameboard, then you'll need to print at least two sheets of game pieces.
GSTK African Animal Bingo
picture gameboard ~ word gameboard ~ game piecesHave a Merry Christmas, and Happy Christmas! ^_^
Well, it was a good thing I had the December pages done ahead of time, because I was sick and not up to doing any for a few weeks. Still can't play online and grasp the bright inspiration of before but managed to get this one out. Santa hasn't visited this home in ages... I guess I'm just too naughty.
Other amusement: Everyone gives me a hard time about my "dinosaur" flip phone, and I just thought it so funny seeing a commercial recently for smart phones that are now flip phones. ^,^ Yeah, my flip phone is just a simple minute phone that can't even get images, just text, but it's still funny how people have dissed flip phones and now they probably bought flip phones for Christmas. ^,^
2021Dec27 - FIXED the BINGO gameboard page. ^.^; I happened to notice that the file size was different than the other pages and finally realized I somehow hadn't made the dimensions the same. ^.^; It probably wasn't printing properly for you - either getting cut off or squishing. Even though I don't check email everyday, this is why I have an email address, so don't be afraid to let me know when there's a problem with a page or the site! ^_^ gstk83@catlover.com (copy/paste, or type, it into whatever mail program you use :)
2021Sept - I was finally lucky enough to get a shot of a heron in flight, and I also got one of him with the swan. ^_^ I've often tried before, but they're too fast for me to get my phone lined up with the binoculars. This day, I happened to have already had it out, experimenting with shots of the swan, when two blue herons flew right between us - and then back across, too! ^_^ Again, not the greatest of photographs, but they're not indistinguishable blurs or with their wings at an angle that makes them look like just a line in the air. I am so thrilled. ^_^
Before that fun, one of the great egrets flew into an area behind the swan where I could get both in frame at the same time. Not very clear, but you can see how the swan is a very solid, roundish bird, while herons are, well, skinny sticks of a bird. Two very different white birds.
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Be a steward of the Earth.
~ * ~ Coloring pages: 2021 Jan-Mar ~ * ~ 2021 Apr-Jun ~ * ~ 2021 July-Sept ~ * ~ 2021 Oct-Dec ~ * ~
~ * ~ 2017 ~ * ~ 2018 ~ * ~ 2019 ~ * ~ 2020 ~ * ~
~ * ~ Home ~ * ~ Fun with paints ~ * ~ More Fun ~ * ~ GSTK Activities ~ * ~ GSTK Cards ~ * ~
Coloring pages may be printed from here and made copies of for non-profit, free-of-charge use only. ~ Don't have a printer? Out of ink? Libraries are typically happy to print things like this out for you. Some may charge a small fee, others will print a page or two at no charge. ~ Please do not hotlink to or use my images on other websites. Simply direct people to my homepage: godsavetheking.neocities.org , thanks! Plant seeds!
[I'm not a professional and have limited resources/access; so the image quality isn't very 'clean' on some, but they print/copy fine. I make the printable images to be around 8x11 inches to fill a sheet of regular letter-size paper.]
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