Vintage Bluebird ATCs

A tiny little piece for you today. I was making my ATCs yesterday for my club swap tonight and wanted to go vintage and blue. Our "theme" was to use paint somewhere on our cards, so here's what I did. I covered a piece of cardstock entirely with Ranger's Distress Crackle Paint in Picket Fence, and set it aside to let it dry. Now, if you try this, DON'T BE ALARMED when you come back and find your cardstock all curled up! It's okay - this paint is wonderfully bendable when dry, and won't flake off no matter how much you bend it to make it flat. I cut out a bunch of ovals using my old Creative Memories oval cutters. After that, I stamped the Tree Swallows Silhouette image from Cornish Heritage Farms with StazOn ink in Midnight Blue. (Okay, so technically they're not bluebirds, but if I stamp them in blue and call them bluebirds, then they're bluebirds! Right? Right? LOL!) I then distressed the image with Ranger Distress Inks in Antique Linen and Faded Jeans. For the card base, I used some Bazzill cardstock, some beautiful K and Company patterned paper from the Blue Awning line, and some pages from a vintage French school reader that I found in an antique store. I adhered the image, then had a little fun with some copper embossing powder. I took my Versamark pen and dabbled the edges of the card, then heat embossed with the copper. I was going for a worn gilded look.

Something was missing, though. I slept on it, waiting for inspiration to strike. Luckily, I got up this morning and saw Julia's Ways to Use It Challenge over on SCS. It came to me....add MORE vintage ephemera!! So I got out my vintage buttons and some tiny, rusted vintage keys (plus some newer key charms), and tied them on with some hemp cord. I think that's just what they needed. A tiny dot of K and Company craft glue keeps that knot from untying. I hope the ladies in my group like it tonight. :) Have a wonderful day!