gettin' crafty and a download

Since the giant yard sale is over and I've gotten rid of quite a bit of unused, unwanted stuff, I can finally get to some of my crafting supplies. It's still a disorganized mess, but now I can usually find what I'm looking for. So, I've been inspired to do a bit of Easter crafting. Last year a dear friend gave me the darling vintage looking decoration above. And of course after studying it a bit, I thought to myself "I can make this." Sound familiar? How many times have you had that thought? I do it all the time. And half of the time I never attempt it, and a large part of the time I attempt it, run into a problem, and abandon the whole project. And then there are the few times I actually start and finish a copy-cat project in a reasonable amount of time. Usually those projects are something I want to use as a gift, so I'm more motivated to finish it. Case in point. I think these will make sweet little gifts.

The main thing I needed for this project was vintage Easter post cards. My other dear BFF shared with me a collection of vintage postcards to scan. And there were a few Easter cards in the collection. Perfect.

These are so super easy to make. The supplies are simple, I had all the materials in the house already. Since it's a small project, it's a good opportunity to use up little bits of ribbon and paper.

Here is what you'll need:

Chipboard or foam core board

white cardstock

adhesive (I like to use spray adhesive)

white glue

hole punch

ribbon to hang the finished card, and to cover the edges of the foam core board

sandpaper

colored eyelets (optional)

glitter

paint brushes

brown ink pad and sponge (optional)

vintage Easter postcard image (the download link for the images I used can be found the end of this post)

I used chipboard for some and white foam core board for another. I think I like the foam core board better. But the chipboard gives it a bit more of a vintage look, I think.

Print out the image onto white cardstock, you can get two images per 8 1/2 x 11 sheet, or you can resized them and easily get three to a page.

Cut your chipboard or foam core board to fit the size of the printed image and glue the printed image on top. Once that is dry, I used sandpaper to even and smooth the edges.

On the chipboard cards I sponged the edges with the brown ink to 'age' the cards. You could also add a layer of colored cardstock or paper to the back of the chipboard for a pretty finish.

I punched two holes at the top and set colored eyelets in the holes.

I then used white glue along the edge of the foam core board and attached ribbon all the way around to finish off the edge.

Once that was dry, I pulled the ribbon through the holes and knotted the ends to make a hanger. ( I use a small crochet hook to pull the ribbon through the holes.)

I watered down some white glue, painted it around the edge of the image, and dusted it with white glitter.

The above card I used foam core board, below are chipboard cards.

There you go. Couldn't be easier. {I won't mention that I have glitter everywhere, including on my camera. Like a child with the glitter.}

Don't you think these would be cute tied to Easter baskets? Or perfect to send in the mail to a special friend. If you'd like to try whipping up a few of these here are links to download the images I scanned.

Easter Chicks and Easter Bunny

Happy Crafting.

xo maureen

purple tuesday musings and a link up

Hello blog peeps! I've been absent this past week and missed all of you. I caught a nasty virus and had some real-life household projects to catch up on. Well, I'm not caught up, but I've got a good start. And despite the crappy weather here, (snow AGAIN in the forecast) I'm feeling much better. I just wish it would warm up and stay warm so I could run outside. I despise the treadmill, and I'm woefully behind in my marathon training. But that's another story.

I took the above photo last fall in a St Louis neighborhood full of colorful characters as well as homes and business. That door makes me smile, and it must make everyone who approaches it smile. Isn’t that a perfect way to welcome your guests? Of course, as soon as I saw a purple door, I knew I had to take a photo for Happy Purple Tuesday. 

So, lots going on today. Happy Purple Tuesday! yay! and I'm musing at Mortal Muses today about a totally different door. What can you say about a door? Well, pop over and take a look. I'm also excited about  Kim Klassen hosting a texture link up at the Cafe.

 Kim's textures nutmeg and celebrate used.

For this link up Kim asked us to choose our favorite textured image. That was difficult, I have a number of favorite textured images, and changed my mind three times. Usually my favorite image is the last one I worked on. *grin* Be sure to check out the link up at Kim's place.

thanks for stopping by

xo

maureen







the view from here

This week's Focus 52 prompt is "the view from here." I took the above photo last Sunday,  the first day of spring. It was lovely and warm and the earth was beginning to come alive with color. I took a walk looking for signs of spring, and found quite a few.

And the day came when the risk to remain tight in a bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom. ~ Anais Nin



And I found this fellow hanging out in my backyard. I live in the city, folks, so this was quite a surprise the first time I saw him. There is this very small stand of trees in my backyard, and this gorgeous creature claims them as part of his territory. I was sitting on my back patio when I heard the birds making a loud ruckus. That's when I saw him. This is the first time he let me get this close, and he never took his eyes from me while I continued to walk closer and closer.

So, that's the view from here from last weekend. Yesterday it looked more like this:

Yes, more snow. Snow that stuck. Snow that piled up. Snow that was enough to be measured. (I don't know how much we got, I just know they predicted between 3-7 inches.) I guess the good thing, if there is a good thing about a Spring snow fall, is that it doesn't stay for long. Today most of it is gone.

Hopefully it will warm up enough soon so that I can put these back on my patio.

I'm linking up at Jan's for Focus 52. Hope you are having a wonderful spring where you are.



{I know, I know, again with the font problems. I'm working on it. :) }

xo
maureen

texture to go

Happy Sunday! *sigh* today is the last day of my vacation. It's been lovely having the time off and getting some projects completed. Yesterday finished up the second day of a yard sale. I've never been so exhausted by a yard sale. But I'm quite happy to have so much 'stuff' out of my house and a bit of change in my pocket for my trouble. And the bestest part? My porch is empty! Yay! You may remember this horrifying photo {scroll down, it's still there}. I still can't believe I shared that on the world wide web. Once I get my spring/summer things out I'll share a photo of the cleaned up space.

I'm musing today at Mortal Muses about  camera phone photography. I'd love it if you stopped by for a visit, and you can see the photo from the Mortal Muses Flickr group taken by JoGo  that started me on this odyssey. Today I thought I'd share a little bit more about my process using my phone to get the final look that I like using my iphone and camera apps.

Using the camera app that comes standard on my iphone 3Gs I took this photo {above}. This is the original SOOC {straight out of camera} shot. That vintage camera is my newest addition to my camera collection. Sweet no?

I then opened the image using the Iris app. In Iris you can do quite a bit of post processing. First I slightly cropped the image. Using the Histogram I lightened it and using Adjustments I desaturated it. I then saved that image to my camera phone library. That allows me to open it in another app from this point. I like this image as a base photo to play with because it has just a hint of color left. 

{image processed with Iris app} 

Iris has quite a few nice textures and overlays. Using the same saved base photo in the Iris app,  I went to Layers>One-Touch. My favorite texture is in the Vintage collection, Old Book. I applied that texture. There is a slider bar at the bottom that allows you to adjust opacity of the texture layer. After making my adjustment, I selected Apply and saved the image. Iris also has an undo feature. You can undo at this point, and begin again from here with a different layer for a different look.

Next I opened the Bad-Camera app. I loooove this app, it's by far my favorite post-processing app. Bad Camera has textures and overlays and frames, oh my. *grin*

{image processed with Bad Camera app}

 

This is the desaturated image from Iris with a words overlay applied using Bad Camera. I'm really lovin' the words overlay effect at the moment, can you tell? 

The only thing about Bad Camera that I don't like, is that you can't apply more than one effect/layer to a photo at once. If you want to multi-layer, the image must be saved to the camera library with each layer and re-opened to add another layer. But what I do love about Bad Camera is that it allows you to mark effects as favorite making it easier to recreate the same look with a different photo.

{image processed with Bad Camera app}

For this final image {above}  I applied an additional old-photo-grunge-type layer and a frame layer. I love all of the different frames offered in Bad Camera.

 

Seriously? I could play for hours with this, the combinations are endless. Ha! My texture addiction is now mobile. I am officially in love.

What about you? What are your favorite camera phone apps? Or what app would you like to try? Share your favs with us in the comment section and I'd love it if you'd share a link to your camera phone shots in the comments.

I hope you have a great week, thanks for stopping by

xo
maureen

 

1000 cranes for Japan

Because she says it quite eloquently, from my Flickr contact, damiec:

The crane is a mystical, holy creature in Japan - it represents luck, good fortune, and long-life. The act of folding cranes, specifically, 1000 cranes, is said to make the folder's wish come true.

Strings of one thousand paper cranes are often sent to places where tragedy has struck as a symbol of hope & healing. Sometimes groups will fold 1000 cranes for an ailing friend in hopes of speeding her recovery.

Whether you believe in the power of the crane, or simply in the gentle act of beauty and kindness, there is something uplifting about this tradition.

. . .  my shoebox of origami paper is out and I am folding cranes. If any of you feel inspired to do the same, I am including a link for an origami tutorial.

I think it would be a beautiful show of support and love for Japan if flickr was flooded with paper cranes. Is it too much to hope for a virtual chain of 1000 cranes?

And so damiec created a flickr group 1000 cranes for Japan. You can see some of her lovely cranes here, here, and here. Again from damiec:

some of my Japanese contacts have let me know how moved they are by the beautiful images in the pool, and by the notion that so many all over the world are holding them in their hearts and thoughts.
please help me spread the word till we reach 1000

This crane, above, was my first attempt.

The Muses have offered support for this project also. You can read about it here. {The photos in the mosaic above are from damiec and my fellow muses.}

Muse Mosey is offering an opportunity to own one of her beautiful prints and raise money for the relief effort in Japan through the Red Cross. For details read more here.

As of this posting there are 354 photos of cranes  added to the Flickr group 1000 Cranes for Japan. We would love to have you add your photos and help us reach the goal of 1000.

I'm also linked up with Focus 52, this weeks theme is green. 

{And if I can ever get the font straighetend out on my blog it will be a miracle.}

xo

maureen

iphone textures and spreading joy

Okay, so the snow is gone, and it warmed up today, and is supposed to be in the high 70s Thursday. I promise to stop whining about snow/cold. {provided Mother Nature holds up her end of the bargain, heh}

I have a post due at Mortal Muses Sunday on camera phone photography. Um, right. I don't do camera phone photography. Sooooo, I did a bit of research and realized that I can do textures on my iphone! How cool is that? I can play with textures in post processing anywhere now! As you can see, I have a few images from my practice today. I found the key to getting a feel for how the textures would work is beginning with a photo that is neutral in color. It helped me to see the subtleties of each texture.

The photo above is a bit over done with texture, because I found it to be quite a challenge to see detail on my iphone.

The text overlay could be a bit more subtle on this shot below, also.

This one is better, but still a little heavy on the texture.



I think this one is getting closer.

I really like this last one. Fairly subtle and I am totally in love with the old photo edges. I'm just amazed that I was able to do these on my iphone with $5 worth of iphone apps. {Curious what iphone apps I used? I listed them in my camera phone post at Mortal Muses. Be sure to check it out on Sunday. }

~ Spreading Joy ~

Jamie at Lyrical Journey is Spreading Joy by hosting a Spring Swap. From her blog:

What's a swap? It's simple - I'll collect the names of all those interested, match them up and then everyone will prepare, send and receive a little something special in the mail.

What should go in your package? Things that would bring someone joy: a much love book, a mixed cd, something you lovingly handcrafted, a beautiful shell you picked up on the beach, your favorite chocolate, prints of your best photos, the list of possibilities is endless. Just remember, it doesn't have to be expensive, with a bit of creativity you can make someone's day.

If you'd like to participate {and we'd love to have you} just hop over to Jamie's place read through the post and email her with your info. It's that easy. Of course, you get to spread a little joy as well as receive a little joy.  And who wouldn't love a little unexpected joy in their mail box this spring?

xo
maureen

not yet spring

Really? Less than a week before Spring? Two inches of snow. Ugh.
Sure, first day of Spring Break and I wake up to two inches of snow. I know right?
Isn't it ironic. Don't you think.
Could be worse, could be . . .
. . . like rain on my wedding day.
Oh, wait. I had that too. And that didn't work out well in the end.
But that's another story.
Ahem.
The snow yesterday was the pretty kind. Large fluffy flakes that stuck to everything. Lovely photo opportunities. Except I'm soooo over snow photos. And? Some of the trees are budding. That lovely tree above looks like this up close.

And some of the bulbs have begun to open. Like these daffodils.

I played with this photo in PSE quite a bit today. Kim Klassen posted a new texture technique in the Test Kitchen and I wanted to try it out.   I wanted to do another one of those fun before & after mouse overs with these two photos. But gosh it takes me so much time to do those because I forget each time, and it's like doing the whole thing from scratch. So, because it's spring break, and I have lots of things to still mark off my to-do list, here you go, the before shot below.

I hope it's warm and sunny where you are today. :)

xo
maureen

variety

Just a quick post today. I started my Spring Break this weekend and I am overly optimistic that I will get everything a few things checked off my to-do list. I kicked off the holiday last night with dinner and a margarita at a favorite Mexican restaurant.

This week's prompt for Focus 52 is variety. I have been so busy today, that I didn't take time for my camera throughout the day. I found myself, after I lost all natural light, wondering what on earth I was going to shoot today. I looked up, and noticed I had left my nail polish collection out.

hummmm

variety.

Perfect.



And I couldn't resist a little bit of texture. You can always join in the fun at Jan's each weekend for Focus 52. Hope to see you there.



xo

maureen