Traveling Pants

I have my traveling pants on.  Going to visit our son in Virginia.  Making a few stops a lot the way and hope to find a few crafting goodies.

In the meantime, thought I would share the pictures of my grandsons (Nick, Nathan, and Nolan) playing in a local farmers field of flowers.

Have a most wonderful day.  Valerie

What A Blessed Easter Week

Oh what a blessed Easter week.  Celebrated the resurrection of Jesus Christ with our church family.  Had a wonderful visit at the house with grandkids.  Lots of pictures for next post.  Just wanted to share a few more of my antique postcard collection with you.  These Easter cards are dated 1909 through 1912.

This one has silver leaf on the cross.  Easter Blessings Be Thine has swirls of flourishes all around it.  The card is postmarked 1912 on the back.  Printed in Germany, it was part of a series.

This postcard has an embossed silver cover.  There is a pretty country scenic view behind the egg.  Postmarked 1909, this card was printed in Berlin, Germany.
 

I really like this one.  It has a gold embossed cross on the cover.  The baby chicks are hatching from a nest that is nestled in what looks like a cherry blossom branch.  This card seems to try and cover all the bases on Easter day.  May Easter Joys attend thee is the sentiment.  The border has a blue ribbon running a long the entire edge.

This cute card was printed in Worcester, Mass. in the U.S.  No date on the back.  It has baby chickens hatching all along the top.  Pretty.

Hope you all had a wonder Easter week.  We had our a wonderful family get-together after church.  I'll have to post the pictures of the grandsons playing in a field of flowers that are beautiful...I mean of course the grandsons.

Blessings to you all. Valerie



French Inspired Wall Hanging

Oh this was so much fun to make.  A client asked me to custom make a wall hanging for her daughter's French teacher.  She wanted one of my Proverbs 31 reversible name banners with the teachers name SARAH on the front.

Yeah!  Would love to do something French.  I pulled out everything I had that was French.  Play with it all, then got down to building this piece.  Lots of layers.

Started with Paris.  The Eiffel Tower, then thought about the French marketing places and all those beautiful flowers.  Lots of flowers.

A small nod to Madame Pompadour and Louis XV.

Included a spray of pearls embellishing this panel with a delicate white satin rosette.

This panel included one of my tea dyed tags with french script stamped on it tucked behind the R.  Mulberry paper roses of pink and white are used.

Use layers of french papers on each panel.  Ripped, tore, and rolled back papers.  Created an aged patina using vintage photo distressing ink.

To soften this panel I added a lovely white feather, a hand-made stick pin and more mulberry paper flowers.

Tim Coffey designer paper was used as the base background on both the front and back.  It has a french feel to its design of aged paint and flourishes.

Charms of Paris and the Eiffel Tower hold a prominent place on the final panel.

The back of each panel has a portion of the Proverbs 31 scripture The Wife Of Noble Character.  Each piece is aged with vintage photo ink and curled by hand to create an aged patina to the complete piece.  The finished size of the wall hanging was just over 38 inches in length.

Hope you have enjoyed see this French inspired wall hanging.  Leave me a comment as they are always appreciated.

Valerie

Colors Of My Day: Blue

These little blue flowers are coming up all along the canal down by our lake.

How cheerful they are in the morning sunlight.

They don't last long, just a few days.

New ones coming up, showing their color and then fading away.

Our canoe among the flowers, waiting for us to venture out onto the lake.

I must get back to crafting.  Finishing up a French inspired wall hanging.  Hopefully, I'll get it done, video taped, photographed, and posted for you all to see by Wednesday. 

Many blessings,

Valerie

Storm Damage Leaves A Big Mess

We are all okay, including the horses, goats and chickens, but the storm that came through this morning did a lot of tree damage.

What a mess.  Besides a lot of broken branches, we had four trees come down completely.

Yes, I think we had a tornado come through.

My garden took a hit.

The 6 foot high sugar snap peas where completely knocked down to the ground.  Hopefully, I can set them back upright.  I'll have to start canning those peas tomorrow.

Roses took a beating, some stripped of every petal, but a few hung on.

I can still count my blessings.  At least we have power.  Many neighbors without electricity.  Bill and I rode our bikes and check on several of the neighbors.  Everyone is the area is fine.  No one hurt. 

Well, time to get back to clean up.

Gone With The Wind Hostess Gift

This was a lot of fun to design and make.  The client asked if I would make some of my lovely tags for her event.  The theme at her table was Gone With The Wind. 

Instead of producing a tag, I showed her the easel card idea.  She loved it.  Everyone at her table would be able to take one of these home with them as a thank you gift for sponsoring a plate at her table. 

I love Southern vintage style.

This design also allowed for the client to write a personal message to each person.

You can watch my YouTube tutorial on this project here.



I made a few extra of these easel Gone With The Wind cards and will be posting them on my FaithfulCrafter etsy store tomorrow.  Enjoy!