golden book baby shower invitations

I recently offered to throw a baby shower for a good friend of mine, and because this will be her second child and she already has a house full of hand-me-downs, she requested that the gift giving be kept to a minimum. Partially because of that request (and partially because she's a book lover like me) I settled on a "vintage / classic kids' books" shower theme.

The invitations went through an extensive brainstorming and planning phase, after which I finally decided to use vintage Golden Books as the base.

This may not be a new idea entirely; since landing on the concept I've seen a few different versions of Golden Book baby shower invitations. A few use just the covers, discarding the pages.

Yikes. As a book lover throwing a party for a book lover, that idea makes me throw up in my mouth a little. Admittedly, I have that response to pretty much any project I see people blogging about when it involves chopping up vintage books, even having worked in bookstores and witnessed what happens to mass market paperbacks. Or maybe because of it.

Anyway, I trolled St. Vincent dePaul's section of kids' books to find some classic titles in older editions with a bit of age to them. Because the guest list was small, I didn't mind that each of the books was different, but this project might be a little extreme for a guest list of more than a dozen.

Of course, Baby Animals was pretty perfect for this project, but really, nearly any Golden Book can be altered to make the perfect invitation (as shown above).

Using my YA Library Book Slips fabric design as a base in Adobe Illustrator, I designed and printed out some library check-out slips on manila card stock using the family's last name (Geisel, in this case, is a pseudonym) in place of the author and "The New Baby" as the title.  These were the "registry" info cards, except in this case they included language inviting people to forego traditional registry gifts in favor of vintage kids' books or small handmade items.

The little envelopes to hold the cards inside the books are made of the same card stock trimmed, folded, and held in place with GlueDots. (If you can't find manila card stock, do what I did and cut some manilla file folders down to 8.5 x 11" sheets using a paper cutter.)

I scanned the front cover (inside and outside) to alter slightly in Photoshop.

For the fronts, I added on each book the words "& Baby Geisel" to the title, matching the the title font and wear pattern as closely as possible.

For printing on the reverse, I moved up the bookplate and made the endpaper pattern fully repeat, before layering on the text in a font similar to the Little Golden Books font. (Click to zoom for detail.)

Printed and trimmed . . .

. . . then scored along the spine and ready to attach . . .

. . . with three glue dots.

I used washi tape tabs to indicate where to open the books . . .

. . . and used more washi tape (white and yellow, so the golden spines still showed through a bit) to cover the spines. Then I tied them up with baker's twine and put them in some shipping envelopes to ready them for mailing (complete with logo for the Geisel Family Library Foundation).

Repeat for all titles.

This project is, admittedly, a bit labor intensive and requires some knowledge of Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator. Like the look but want to skip the work? I can put some together for you, too! Contact me for pricing and scheduling by leaving a comment below, or by e-mailing (whoamillie (at) thenightgarden.com).

Thanks for reading!

p.s. you can make these photos larger simply by clicking on them, but you probably already knew that.

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I'm Crafty!

thrift store finds: campaign dresser + yellowstone pennant

The bedroom is in a transitional stage (urgh, the walls . . . look away . . . LOOK AWAY!), but I wanted to share this vintage campaign-style dresser and Yellowstone National Park pennant I picked up at an estate sale a couple of weeks back. The dresser came with a mirror, too, though I haven't found a place to put it yet.

The dresser set somehow survived until Sunday and I put in a bid on it, since there were no other takers. To my surprise I won (it was too low for what the dresser is worth, but I couldn't justify budgeting more), and eventually we made the decision to get rid of my husband's old 1990s oak veneer dresser and put this one in its place. 

I cleaned up the dresser and papered the drawer bottoms with old nautical charts, but otherwise, I'm waiting on making changes or updates.

I've seen a lot of painted or refinished campaign furniture on Etsy and Pinterest, but I kinda like the speckled wood stain. Link up in the comments section below if you've seen a campaign furniture makeover I need to see before making up my mind.

I love the pennant a ton. It's screen-printed wool felt and probably dates to the 1940s. The only way it could be better is if it were from Glacier (where we visited this summer).

Eventually, I'll get the walls replastered, primed, and painted and I'll give you a look at the finished room . . . but honestly, a foot on all sides of these photos is kind of a disaster area right now, so it'll probably be awhile.

Thanks for reading! Any unexpected thrift scores of your own lately? Do tell! I love following your (non-spam) links to look at pretty stuff.

p.s. you can make these photos larger simply by clicking on them, but you probably already knew that, clever you!

Linking up to:

Junkin Joe's Vintage and Thrifty Finds

The Shabby Nest

Mod Mix Monday

Thrift Share Monday

The Thrifty Groove

The Bright Green Door Blog

thrift store finds: book storage

As previously mentioned, we keep a lot of books around. Our collection of kids' books is especially large, since I've been collecting continuously since I was a kid myself. The seven years I spent in bookstores increased this collection exponentially, and now that there's an actual child in the house, the need for book storage has gotten critical.

There's a bright red magazine/book rack in the living room; this one (formerly a magazine rack, found at Goodwill on 1/2-price day for $3) will be indigo-colored soon.

Martha Stewart Living gave me the idea for this solution, a wooden cd crate we attached to the side of the changing table. Wooden cd and tape crates at the thrift stores run between $2 and $4, depending on condition. Single-bottle wine crates also work well for this.

Of course, since we moved the changing table out a couple of weeks back, the crate isn't currently in use, but I have a future home in mind for it.

In fact, I have a couple more ideas up my sleeve, so I'll be visiting this topic again. In the meantime, though, I have a pretty awesome recent thrifty find to share with you.

This book rack, formerly from a classroom or library, has the benefit of face-forward book display space, as well as a couple of traditional bottom shelves for more toys and books.

I also love the way it leans back to prevent tipping.

The kiddo and I picked it up for $30 at BRING, and then I measured and marked it for the Mister. He cut about eight inches off the bottom so that the height would be better for the chosen location.

I can't tell you how much I love it. We all do!

Hey, bonus thrifty finds: many of the books on the shelf are thrifted! Alice in Wonderland ran me $2.99 at the Village; Goodnight Moon and The Bremen Town Musicians were 49 cents each at Goodwill. There are tons more on the shelf that I picked up second-hand, but those three you can actually see in the above photos. Goodwill is a great source for us, as their kids' books are all 49 cents. That's less than I'd pay for late library book fines (I promise you, it's true).

Okay. There are a few of my thrifty book storage finds; you can check out some more over on my Book Storage Pinterest Board.

My thrift store obsessions are kids' books and storage; what are you always on the hunt for?

Thanks for reading!


p.s. You can make these photos larger just by clicking on them, but you probably already knew that.


Linking up to:

Simple Design's Thrift Haul
Cap Creations' Thrifty Love
Thrift Share Monday
I'm Crafty!
Mop it Up Mondays

red highchair

At the end of last summer, we ran across a wooden restaurant-style high chair at a car boot sale (flea market) a couple of miles from the house. It was $5. I snapped it up, since Baby P's shins had a habit of hitting the high chair we were using. I took it as a sign he was starting to outgrow the high chair, and as I found out at his two-year appointment, he had, in fact, surpassed the weight and height limits set by the manufacturer.

But a new problem presented itself when his shins also hit the cross bar in the new high chair. Imagine there was much cursing at this new discovery. I only imagined it, too, since the bebe repeats everything these days.

I'd resigned myself to getting rid of it via Craigslist and buying a booster seat to strap into a dining chair . . . until I saw a post on another blog about repainting an old wooden high chair, sans tray. And inspiration struck.

Remove the lap bar and straps, and suddenly, we have a functional chair that can we can scoot up to the table without our swiftly growing kiddo getting banged up.

Here are the bar and straps, after.

This is what's left after snipping the straps off of the bottom.

A screwdriver and a pair of pliers take care of the rest.

And thank goodness I ended up pulling the thing apart, because now I don't worry about all the restaurant grime left in and around the straps.

Here's what the arm rests looked like after removing the bar (loosening a few screws made removing the bar very simple!).

And here's the chair, scrubbed, sanded, and de-glossed, ready for paint.

I decided to paint the underside first, using the same cherry red Krylon paint+primer I used for the magazine rack . . . and our front door. Three light coats, with about 20 minutes dry-time in between.

Then I let it dry overnight before flipping it over and painting the top side.

Also three light coats + touch ups.

And there you go! I let it cure outside for about a week (the weather was still cool back in March, so I waited until the smell of spray paint faded).

I added some self-adhesive furniture felt to the runners to keep the chair from marking up the floors, and brought it inside. The kiddo is a big fan! How about you?

The paint has held up really well over the past several weeks; no scuffs, scratches or dents in the surface yet. And that's it for red, for awhile. My next spray paint project is pool blue and leaf green, so stay tuned!


(p.s. you can make these pictures bigger by clicking on them, but you probably already knew that.)



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new stuff for sale at night garden vintage

I recently listed some new items for sale at my Night Garden Vintage shop, including this sweet vintage red bowling bag that I rediscovered during the clean-out.




It was, soon after, added to someone's treasury list, but still remains for sale. Snap it up using the coupon code from one of my previous posts, and it can be yours for a steal!