crafts | kimberly ah

Jan 17 2014

January Paper Parcel

My first installment of Paper Parcels arrived in the mail on Wednesday. It had been the cause of much stress for over a week because apparently the Polar Vortex was holding it hostage for awhile. When I saw it lounging in my mailbox, I squealed with delight and opened it right away. The picture above shows it right out of the package…adorable, right? I didn’t unwrap the package for two days because I was savoring it. Today I finally opened it and pored through the fifty pieces of old paper, playing cards, labels, stamps and other vintage bits. All of the pink and red goodness is getting me excited for Valentine’s Day…I love Valentine’s Day (as mentioned here) and now I’m feeling the urge to start working on some Valentine mail. (Too soon?)It was hard to pick out my favorite vintage bits from the pack, but the things above caught my heart. I’m especially smitten with the Mohr Beverages label, the playing cards (the medallion, the horse, the girl and the hugging cat & dog), the vintage Valentine (she’s TYPING!) and Dennison labels, saver stamps and old BINGO cards are always enjoyed around here. And this little card–from a 1970s penny arcade game–made me laugh. In case the type is too small, it says:

Modern Miss:

The pace you set is too speedy for me. You travel on five wheels with no brakes, and have lost all control. I like the shy, old-fashioned miss who hasn’t forgotten how to blush. With women I am just a babe in the wood, so you are too dangerous for me. Bye Bye baby–get a hip flask daddy.

Your old fashioned,

Ralph

Ralph sounds fun, right?

I’m super excited for the next five months of my subscription. I love a good themed package and Xenia has a true talent for vintage paper pack curating. Thanks, Naoto, for such a fun gift (and for taking the hint from my Pinterest boards!)

For more detailed pictures of the Paper Parcel, see the Saturday Morning Vintage blog.

Tagged Christmas, crafts, mail art, snail mail, vintage

Jan 16 2014

2 Comments

Christmas, crafty adventures, Office Supplies, snail mail

More Mail Fun with the Cat Note Template

One of my favorite Christmas gifts was this ingenious Cat Note Template from Paper Pastries. It was a gift from Mollie, who knows me well enough to know that cats + letter writing = perfect gifts. I decided to use it for my long-overdue thank you note to Mollie.

Basically, you just trace the template onto any paper of your choice, cut it out, fold it up and it it’s ready to tuck into a 4-bar sized envelope. (Which, at 3 5/8 x 5 1/8, is almost the smallest mailable envelope size.)

You can use the cat template on plain paper and write your letter directly onto it, but I decided to use the template to make an “inner envelope”. I used an old USA Philatelic magazine as my template paper and then I wrote my note on a 4-bar flat card (from Paper Source). I used my bone folder (more on this tool, soon!) to help crease the edges as I folded the template up with the card inside and I used a piece of washi tape to hold it together. The template comes with marks to make slits so you can tuck the folds into the slits to hold without the help of washi tape, but I like using up some of my washi stash, inch by inch. (You can see the “slit indicators” on the right and bottom sides of the template.)I tucked the kitty in a fuchsia envelope, used my new Vintage Email stamp (clearer picture below…gold is hard to photograph!) and called it done. (Unfortunately, I didn’t get a picture of my corresponding cherry blossom postage stamp before I dropped the thank you in the mailbox.)I’m looking forward to creating more cat-themed mail soon!

Tagged Christmas, crafts, diy, mail art, office supplies, snail mail

Dec 30 2013

5 Comments

Christmas, holidays, Merry & Bright, snail mail, vintage

Our 2013 Holiday Cards

Our 2013 Christmas cards were sent, and hopefully they’ve arrived at their destinations near and far. As I mentioned in this post, I decided to stop putting all the pressure on myself to make our cards. Instead, I bought them. I picked up the Winter Greetings card a few years ago on clearance. I loved the little chubby bird! I purchased the Andy Warhol Christmas tree card this year at Paper Source. I loved its vintage look and tiny size. (I’m a sucker for tiny greeting cards.) And the vintage Season’s Greetings card was a gift from Jennie Hinchcliff who offered them up one day on Instagram. I could not resist those vintage beauties. Here’s a closer look at its charming church illustration and inside message:In case it’s unclear it says

To greet you sincerely at Christmas and to wish you Happiness in the New Year.

Sincere Christmas greetings? Absolutely. The card is gorgeously embossed–the church, the bells, the people and the tiny snow details are raised on the page. I had to save just one…the others went to lucky pen pals. I ordered these holiday paper coasters from the Paper Source and added them with some of my cards. In a moment of bad planning, I realized that my Andy Warhol cards were too small to hold the coaster…oops. Naoto and I are using the leftovers for entertaining at home. They feel very festive, especially when cocktails are involved. In spite of having a table full of mail art stuff for the Christmas Card Writing Party, I didn’t go too crazy with mail art. I was having fun playing around with my handwriting and I just used some washi tape, rubber stamps and Stickles to add a tiny bit of pizzazz to the envelopes.

Holiday time is my favorite time of the year for checking my mailbox. People keep saying that no one writes Christmas cards anymore…I’m very lucky that many of my friends and family still value this tradition. A full mailbox is the best Christmas gift.

Tagged Christmas, crafts, holidays, mail art, office supplies, rubber stamp, snail mail, vintage, washi tape

Dec 17 2013

1 Comment

Christmas, crafty adventures, holidays, Office Supplies, snail mail, vintage

Christmas Card Writing Party

On Sunday night I hosted a little Christmas card writing party. I sent out some (last minute) vintage invitations from Saturday Morning Vintage. Aren’t they cute? It’s hard to tell in the pictures, but I added a touch of glitter to each wreath using my favorite glue pen and some Martha glitter. I typed up gold labels for the addresses (some were mailed, some were hand delivered) and embellished the envelopes with some washi tape. Fun stuff. I started collecting my holiday-ish supplies all last week. I have loads of things, mainly from making my own cards in the past. On Sunday morning, I covered the table with kraft paper and set out the stamps, tapes, inks, Stickles and stickers. (I learned from the best by attending so many LWA socials!) On Sunday evening, the ladies came over and we ate funeral buns (I told you they would be a new party staple!) and salmon dip and caramels. We enjoyed mulled wine and got more done than I thought we would! Jackie already finished her holiday cards, so she painted some ornaments. Karen and I wrote our cards. I got through the L’s…not including my pen pals (because their envelopes are more involved than some of the rest of my list). Tonight, my goal is to finish them up…I’m in a mail art kind of mood, so it should be a fun project!

I’ll report back on the cards soon. I want them to make it to their destinations before sharing on the blog.

Have you finished your holiday cards? Have you been getting a lot in your mailbox?

Tagged Christmas, crafts, holidays, mail art, office supplies, rubber stamp, snail mail, washi tape

Dec 11 2013

3 Comments

adventures at the library, Christmas, crafty adventures

Block Printing at the Library

On Saturday afternoon, I went to a block printing class at our library. The class was taught by Liz and Gabe from Hoofprint Workshop in Chicago. They brought their portable press, made from a car jack (!!!) and had small 3×4 inch blocks for each of us to carve. The class was advertised as a holiday card printmaking class, but Liz made it clear we could carve whatever we wanted. I decided, since I cannot draw (and because I have a little bit of PTSD from a previous printmaking class I tried and promptly dropped out of–a story for another time…or a therapist), that I would do a candy cane striped H. I wanted something with simple lines so I could practice making deep, thick stripes and shallow thin ones and getting comfortable with the tool. I was the first one done cutting my block (most people had more intricate designs) so I inked and printed my block. My first print was okay, but you could barely see the thinnest lines so I worked the rest of the class widening those lines and fussing with the other lines. In the end, the one above was my best impression. It’s more challenging than it looks to get the right amount of ink and the right amount of pressure on the press. Practice, practice, practice! That’s Liz above working the car jack press. I’m obsessed with how genius it is…and Dad, do we have a spare car jack?

I have two linoleum blocks in my craft cupboard and now I have the confidence to tackle them and an idea that involves a little bit more drawing skills than our monogram…wish me luck!

For a better picture of the car jack press and a great article about Hoofprint Workshop, go here. Their workshop is in an old funeral home!!

And, for more Adventures at the Library posts, go here.

Thanks to the Forest Park Public Library for hosting another awesome event and to Liz and Gabe of Hoofprint for sharing their expertise with us!

Tagged adventures, crafts, forest park, holidays

Nov 26 2013

4 Comments

adventures, snail mail

Show of Hands Chicago

On Saturday, Karen and I braved the cold, cold wind and headed to Ravenswood for Show of Hands Chicago. Karen has never been to Renegade and we had plans to go this summer, except my trip to Japan got in the way. When I heard about Show of Hands, I knew it would be a good alternative.

First the space, the Ravenswood Event Center is spacious, interesting and amazing. The architecture and elements are gorgeous and the space holds old cars and crazy-awesome old neon signs. I feel like Naoto would have been entertained by the cars and signs if he had joined us. The Event Center is right off of the brown line, but we drove and parking was plentiful (for the city)…we only had to walk about two blocks from the car.

Second, Show of Hands was well-organized. There was a coat check and a lovely printed program. Everything was marked clearly as if the signs were ushering us into the event center and into the event room. The sellers were close enough to keep the flow going but there was room to breathe, to roam around and space to browse in each booth. (There is nothing worse than getting shoved out of a booth because people are crushing in to see.)

Best of all, it was a well-curated show. The crafters/designers/makers/sellers were all amazing. I could have bought something at every booth. And today I’m kind of kicking myself for not buying a few things (a woven clutch and some tangerine lavender lotion to name two…) It was the perfect size, too. Usually by the end of Renegade, I am DONE looking at things, chatting with sellers and pretending to be interested in the five hundredth ironic t-shirt. At Show of Hands, I never felt this way. It was the perfect variety of things and the perfect amount of shopping.

I can’t show you all of my purchases because I managed to pick up a few gifts. But the gifts for myself are pictured above.

The “Thank You For Being A Friend” postcards are from Zerobird. There are five in the set with the words to the Golden Girls theme song. They also had Three’s Company and Laverne & Shirley sets…obviously, Zerobird has great taste in television.

The vintage stamps and “I must decline for secret reasons” calling cards are from 16 Sparrows/Letter Writers Alliance. There are four versions of those calling cards…perfect for those of us who are a little bit introverted.

The typewriter postcards and the K stationery are from A Favorite Design. I couldn’t resist another monogrammed card and those typewriter cards are going above my desk.

Sidenote: I wish I had taken pictures of our day in action. I feel like I always say this, but I’m not a “blogger”, I’m a person with a blog, so I find myself getting caught up in the moment and enjoying seeing things in person sometimes rather than from behind the camera or my phone. There are some things I go into planning to write about it, and other things I don’t. But Show of Hands was just too good. I hope it’s an annual thing.

Tagged adventures, crafts, letterpress, mail art, shopping, snail mail

Nov 15 2013

3 Comments

celebrations, crafty adventures, holidays, snail mail, Thanksgiving, vintage

Vintage Ephemera Thanksgiving Invitations

I am happy to report that my Thanksgiving invitations are done and in the mail! Seriously, where is this month going? At one point I felt crazy for starting to think about these invites so early, then they barely made it into the mail in time.They aren’t super complicated, but I had a lot of fun putting the mini collages together. Everything on the invite is vintage except the little strip of washi. I needed another metallic element to complement the gold seal. Once I saw the old BINGO cards in my stash, I knew I wanted them to be the base. I love the yellowed paper and the graphic numbers as a background. And of course I had to use my typewriter since tags don’t feed into my (non-existent) printer. I typed out my message and played around with the placement of the vintage postage stamps and gold seals (from a Saturday Morning Vintage Thanksgiving paper pack and fall ephemera bundle) . I pasted everything on with my favorite glue stick because, as I learned at the Halloween Mail Art Workshop, glue sticks work best with delicate vintage papers. The invitation above is the one I sent my parents. The maroon stamp on the bottom (with the gold star) is in honor of railroad workers. My maternal grandpa worked on the railroads, so I think my mom will appreciate that little detail. I had the fig-colored envelopes in A2, which was 1/8 inch too small…so I had to go out and buy some roomy A6 fig envelopes. I made another collage on the front of the envelope with papers from from my ephemera packs (the leaf is a playing card!), some MT washi tape, an old gold border label and a new sticker (Paper Source). I lined my envelopes with marbled paper from Blick. I love this paper. It had a gorgeous mix of maroons, greens, golds and silvers…so dreamy. (And it was in my paper stash ready to be spent out!)

So there they are…done for another year. Now it’s time to work on ideas for the table and…clean!! For more Thanksgiving shenanigans, go here.

Have a good weekend! I’ll be busy today and tonight cramming for book group! The Sea-Wolf here I come!

Tagged crafts, diy, holidays, mail art, snail mail, Thanksgiving, washi tape

Nov 13 2013

Easy Thanksgiving Invitations

I’m still finishing the real Thanksgiving invitations. I had to go out and buy a bigger envelope size (defeating the purpose of using up my stash, but I’m really excited about how the invitations turned out so I needed the just right envelope color!)

When I was playing around with ideas for Thanksgiving invitations (before rediscovering my stash of vintage ephemera) I came up with these as an option. We don’t have a home printer. (Ours broke over a year ago, and I after sifting through thousands of online reviews, I couldn’t make a decision. At this point, I question whether we really need one.) So I decided that my typewriter would be my printing method. I found these leftover paper leaves in my fall decorations bin. The leaves come in a variety of colors, but the ones I chose are shimmery gold. It’s not a perfect paper for the typewriter, especially since my new ribbon is pretty inky, but they worked out okay as long as I didn’t smear the ink with my fingers. The oval-shaped leaf was easy to work with but the “oak” leaf gave me problems because all of its little bumpy edges kept getting stuck as I typed each line…it’s fine though…the little tears just look like texture.

Once I was done typing, I pasted the leaves onto some shimmery antique gold cards and topped them off with a little piece of washi tape. I’m going to put them in some leftover fig envelopes (from Thanksgivings past) and send them to my brother and sister and their families. They don’t join us for Thanksgiving, but it’s always nice to be invited, right?

Tagged celebrations, crafts, diy, holidays, mail art, snail mail, Thanksgiving, washi tape

Nov 08 2013

1 Comment

crafty adventures, holidays, Office Supplies, thrifted, vintage

Vintage Paper Hoarder

I am working on my Thanksgiving invitations today. I have a plan and it involves using up some of my vintage paper collection. I have a giant bin of ephemera that I’ve collected over time. Many things were purchased from Saturday Morning Vintage (Xenia’s shop is so good and most of what is shown above is from a Thanksgiving paper pack that I bought this year.) and from flea markets and thrift shops. Few things in life make me happier than discovering an old box of labels or flashcards at the thrift store.

As I was sifting through my ephemera stash, I was thinking about my 2013 goal to spend out. While I’ve done a very good job wearing out my clothes, using up my stationery and scrapbook supplies, eating my Japanese snacks and hanging up my artwork, I’ve been hesitant to use up the vintage stuff…the stuff that I can’t replace quite as easily… But it’s better to let these papers live on in another form (as mail art or an invitation) than to languish in a bin, right? So I spent part of my afternoon sorting through things and pulling out pieces for certain projects (Thanksgiving and Christmas related right now) and sorting the rest by color or style. I am now prepared to use up and spend out some of my collection. I’m moving a little bit of it onto my desk so it’s handy for mail art and leaving the rest in the bin ready for the next project.

Hopefully, I can finish up the invitations this weekend and show them to you next week, once they’ve arrived at their destinations. In the meantime, have a good weekend!

Tagged celebrations, crafts, holidays, mail art, office supplies, snail mail, Thanksgiving

Nov 07 2013

4 Comments

celebrations, crafty adventures

Blush & Gold Gift

My mom’s birthday was in October. We got her a gift card (booooring!) and I picked up a pretty handkerchief for her in Japan. Such a tiny gift deserved a pretty package, so I whipped up a little decorated paper bag for her present. I love packaging things for my mom because she takes time to notice the little details. It’s a fun way to celebrate the special mom that she is. I started with a little flat kraft bag and layered on anything blush and gold from my craft cupboard (aka the hardware cabinet TV stand–those drawers are awfully handy!). I always have a variety of supplies on hand for mail art, scrapbooking and other projects, so once I collected everything I needed, putting the gift bag together only took about five minutes. It was a happy accident that the pink label fit perfectly on the doily…once that happened, I cruised along layering each piece. I cheered when I discovered that my favorite glue pen was strong enough to hold the tiny gold sequins. (I see more sequins in my future.) I finished off the gift with a little piece of washi tape on the back. Quick and simple. Now if only I could get my act together to fancy up the pile of Christmas gifts…

Supplies used: kraft bags, doilies, peach & gold washi tape, vintage sequins, Rifle labels (these are my favorites!), kraft flags, Quickie glue pen, Souffle pen (not shown), flair button (not shown in supply picture, but shown on package picture).