New: Vintage Garden Catalogues Download

New digital collage sheet I just added to the site today... created with covers and pages from vintage gardening catalogs for flowers and fruit!

Find this printable, and all my most recent digital collage sheets at Lunagirl.com.

Winner of Fruit & Flowers Challenge: Nicie Ibarra

The lucky winner of the drawing for the Fruit & Flowers challenge is #8 by Nicie Ibarra! Congratulations to everyone who played on their beautiful work. I truly appreciate your contributions to my challenges!

The next theme will be FLAPPERS ... who doesn't love flapper girls with their sassy and sultry styles? 

I'll get the new challenge ready to start tomorrow, so be sure to come back and play for a chance to win the random drawing and $15 credit to spend at Lunagirl.com.

Craft Challenge Theme: Fruit and Flowers

New challenge theme: Inspired by beautiful antique botanical prints, my next theme is
FRUIT & FLOWERS

Let dreams of gardens and orchards, bouquets and blossoms and colorful sweet fruit inspire you... any craft medium is OK, from cards and paper crafts to fabric arts and jewelry to assemblage and mixed media and of course digital art too!

Your entry just needs to feature fruit and/or flowers in some way. The Design Team will be working with some of the Victorian botanical prints and other vintage ephemera from Lunagirl... we love vintage but your entry can be any style, just so it's fruit and flowers themed!

Any craft or medium is OK.

Vintage style is encouraged but not required.

Use a Lunagirl image or element and your entry will count twice in the drawing!

Remember to link to this blog and to Lunagirl.com on your site if you have one.

Prize:  Winner will be selected randomly to receive a $15 credit at Lunagirl.com!

Challenge ends at noon CST on Thursday, March 19.

I love it when you use Lunagirl images, and I hope you'll go take a look at my collections... but that's not a requirement!  But do remember that if you use a Lunagirl image, you will be entered TWICE in the drawing! I welcome everyone and every style but also want to give a little something extra to my wonderful customers! Most important is have fun, get creative, enjoy vintage. 

DON'T MISS THE INSPIRATION FROM THE DESIGN TEAM BELOW!
There will be more from the DT later during this challenge, and you'll want to check back to see all the entries as well. We hope you'll share yours!

An InLinkz Link-up

LUNAGIRL DESIGN TEAM

CORINNE MARIE Digital by Corinne

Botanical Life by SHELBY PIZZARRO Sisterhood of the Muse

Cherry Goddess tag by MICHELE STORMS  Art from the Well

3D Flower by VICKI ROMAINE  The Cheerful Stamppad

"The Lunagirl image was printed three times the exact same size and cut apart and then put back into layers with dimensionals to give it a 3D appearance. 
The 3D effect really doesn't show up on the scanning."
I can see the 3D effect ~ it is stunning.

MANDY CHILVERS Journal Page!  TagAlongChallenge.blogspot.com

Paris Botanical Tags Set: Ephemera, Flowers & Fruit

Still working on Paris Botanical tags today... I made another sheet with yellow flowers and golden fruit. Very pretty! While I was at it I realized I should make a sheet of matching tags that are mostly blank and have a place to write -- to use as backs or just to complete the set. So here is the whole set so far... expect more tags in different themes because I'm having fun with these!

More French Botanical Tags... and a Surprise Just for You

Here's another new printable tag sheet ... 

more beautiful botanical prints of flowers and fruit, in gorgeous shabby purple and green, plus lovely vintage aged pages from the French journal Horticole. 

I had so much fun with these, and I hope you will too! I love these colors and the French text.

Here's another little something fun: a discount code just for my blog readers! Use discount code PURPLEPARIS at checkout at Lunagirl.com for 25% off every item until Monday ... just for you!  

Really I just want to see who is listening :-)

NEW Paris Botanical Tags Printable

More new tags!

These are created with pages from a beautiful old French horticulture journal and pretty antique botanical prints of cherries, strawberries, little red flowers and pink lilies. They have a lovely aged sepia color, from the antique paper, and charming French text.

I call this sheet Paris Botanical Tags: Pink & Red Florals. I plan more sheets in this style in other colors (yellow/gold, blue/purple) and other fruit like grapes, apples, pears... I love working with these images.

This first one is available now at Lunagirl.

Creative Challenge: Victorian Flowers & Fans

Welcome to Lunagirl creative challenge #31 -- Our theme this time is "Victorian Flowers and Fans."  Your entry can be any craft or medium, using flowers and/or fans!

This theme is inspired by the Victorian "Language of Flowers" and the "language" of Victorian ladies' fans. During the Victorian era, "flower dictionaries" were popular, and flowers and pictures of flowers spoke a language all their own.  Blossoms, buds, and herbal bouquets were sent to friends and lovers not only for their beauty and fragrance, but also to convey messages -- sometimes messages that the sender dared not speak in words. A Victorian lady's fan could speak volumes as well, especially in a society in which certain sentiments were not properly spoken aloud between unmarried young men and women.

Of course now you want to know some traditional meanings for flowers and fans, yes?  I've created a page just for you!  Check out my Language of Flowers and Fans page at Lunagirl.com!

I would LOVE to see someone use some of the traditional flower meanings for this challenge -- but so to keep things simple let's just require FLOWERS and/or FANS (preferably vintage/Victorian!)     :-)  I have plenty of flowers and fans to inspire you in my Lunagirl.com shop!

Here are the challenge guidelines:

Any craft or medium is OK.

Limit of 3 entries from one person in each challenge, please.

Vintage style is encouraged.

Use a Lunagirl image or element and your entry will count twice in the drawing!

Remember to link to this blog and to Lunagirl.com on your site if you have one.

Prize:  The winner will be selected randomly, to receive a Lunagirl collage sheet CD of your choice! ($25 value).

Challenge ends at noon CST on August 17.

Of course I love if you use at least one Lunagirl.com product, and I hope you'll go take a look at my collection... but that's not a requirement. However, remember that if you use a Lunagirl image, you will be entered TWICE in the drawing! I want to welcome everyone and every style but also give a little something extra to my wonderful customers! 

LINK UP YOUR ENTRIES BELOW TO PLAY (and please don't forget to SCROLL DOWN TO SEE THE Design Team creations!)

An InLinkz Link-up

LUNAGIRL MOONBEAMS DESIGN TEAM

MICHELE STORMS:
Card with images from Blossoms, Fans and Lady of the Flowers.

MANDY CHILVERS:
Images from from Blossoms and Fans 

VICKI ROMAINE:
"The background is a double mat.  One is designer paper and the other is solid cardstock.  The images are LG and the flowers are on a dimensional.  The sentiment is heavy chipboard."

"Floral" challenge at FantasticTuesday

Hey! Lunagirl is sponsoring a FLORAL challenge over at FantasticTuesday: "Where It's Hip to Be Square."  

<<<< Go check it out and join in!

New: Garden Vegetable & French Flowers Seed Packs Collage Sheets

I've spent the last couple of days creating some brand new seed packs collage sheets (just in time for my next blog challenge).   First of all I have three new collage sheets featuring images from my collection of wonderful old Card Seed Company vegetable seed packets.  One of them is 1x2 domino/tile size.

I love the retro artwork on these, and there's a story behind them.  The company closed down long ago, but several sets of unused packets were found in an old barn years later.  From what I can tell I have one of the few complete sets in existence.  The full set of 80 stone lithographic prints, restored and color enhanced, is on my Antique Seed Pack Lithographs CD, in the best image quality available anywhere!

The other two new sheets are completely new. I created them using French flower seed packets I collected from France a few years ago.  I finally got around to scanning some of them!  I have several dozen more flower packets plus just as many French vegetable garden seed packets, so there may be more to come in this style.

Click the sample pics to see the full size collage sheets at Lunagirl.com.

The new blog challenge will start on Monday... in the meantime, it's everything Alice in our Alice in Wonderland blog challenge!  Hope you'll play!

Free Digital Backgrounds created by Lunagirl

We've been featuring the Carte Postale digital backgrounds in most of the Design Team projects, along with a couple of Antique Adverts digital backgrounds, so today I'm spotlighting a different type of digital background I have available.  The freebies below are examples of digital backgrounds I have created from Victorian / Art Nouveau wallpaper patterns!  Two of my favorite colors, and I always love gardens and birds. You can find many more such patterned backgrounds on my collage sheets page at Lunagirl.com.

These digital backgrounds are my altered creations, so if you use them please remember to credit Lunagirl and link back to my site above, but I am happy to share in hopes of inspiring you!  These are nice large images that you can crop, enlarge, or reduce in size as needed.  They are lovely as backgrounds for cards, scrapbooking, and mixed media, and also very pretty for creating jewelry charms.  ~ Karen

Daisies

"Daisies are the friendliest flower, don't you think?" That was in a movie I watched last night, and now I'm thinking of daisies. Folklore says that dreaming of daisies in the spring is good luck (although bad luck in winter!)

Our wild ox-eye daisies haven't arrived here yet, but we have some charming daisy pictures in our Victorian Flowers collection, many of them newly acquired and newly added to the latest edition!

Daisies have long been popular. In medieval times, knights wore them at tournaments and ladies wove them into wreaths and crowns (so I'm told...) On Victorian cards (especially the French ones) we often see daisy-like flowers referred to as Marguerites, and I've learned that queens and princesses named Margaret or Marguerite often took the daisy as their flower.

In the Victorian "language of flowers" the daisy meant Innocence. They are still a symbol of innocence, simplicity, and cheerfulness. Come to think of it, they are indeed the friendliest of flowers.

Victorian Floral Christmas Cards

The custom of sending Christmas cards began in Victorian London in about 1840, and in 1875 Boston lithographer Louis Prang began publishing Christmas cards in America. The earliest cards usually featured colorful flower blossoms or pictures of birds, children or angels.

We couldn't find out much more about floral cards, except that they were part of the Victorians' (and Victorian-era Americans') love for flowers, and that the early, expensive cards were probably sent by wealthy people.

It was inexpensive holiday penny postcards, somtimes imported from Germany, that were sent by most Americans until WWI.



We think these floral cards are lovely and quaint -- they certainly reflect the "shabby" romantic spirit that so many of our customers like!



While cards featuring caroling children, nativity scenes, holly wreaths, and of course dear old Santa Claus fit our traditional idea of Christmas, these old flower cards are sweet for something different.

You'll find them (and hundreds more holiday images) in our Holidays & Occasions 3CD set -- and with holiday greetings removed in our Victorian Flowers collection, to use as flower pictures in your scrapbooking, card making and art.

Free Image (& a Poem): Daffodils

If you're lucky enough to have these beautiful yellow flowers where you live, I think you'll agree they are one of the sweetest signs of spring every year!

This free downloadable image is free for your personal non-commercial use.  Please remember to credit Lunagirl Images if you display your creation online.  

If you would like this image for commercial use, email us at info@lunagirl.com.

 Daffodils by William Wordsworth

I wandered lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o'er vales and hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host, of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine

And twinkle on the milky way,

They stretched in never-ending line

Along the margin of a bay:

Ten thousand saw I at a glance,

Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced, but they

Out-did the sparkling leaves in glee;

A poet could not be but gay,

In such a jocund company!

I gazed—and gazed—but little thought

What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie

In vacant or in pensive mood,

They flash upon that inward eye

Which is the bliss of solitude;

And then my heart with pleasure fills,

And dances with the daffodils.

Featured Artist: Diva Designs

I just had to share some pictures of these beautiful pendants and cylinder beads that Lynda at Diva Designs has been creating!

They are truly lovely and would make a perfect "welcome springtime" gift for yourself or a very lucky friend.


We are so pleased to see the gorgeous image transfer work she has done using our Lunagirl Flowers images and other ephemera. Check out her Diva Designs blog post here: http://scdiva.blogspot.com/2010/02/spring-has-sprung-in-diva-studio.html


Lynda's pendants and beads are available for purchase in her etsy shop Diva Designs. She also sells an image transfer tutorial if you want to try it yourself!

New Collage Sheets! Color Themes

Our latest new Lunagirl collage sheets, in fun color themes!
See all our new designs at
LUNAGIRL.COM and COLLAGESHEET.COM.

What we've been up to lately

We haven't been posting as much here because we are so busy creating new collections and new editions! Just published, a revised edition of our beautiful Victorian Flowers image CD, with more newly acquired, newly restored and embellished flower images. I've been collecting floral postcards for awhile and am glad to offer over 100 beautiful new images on our Flowers CD. Over 900 flowers.

DETAILS & SAMPLE IMAGES HERE

Also just published, we now offer a Victorian Birds CD! We have taken the birds that were formerly offered with our flowers and added to them over 300 new birds images, to create a fabulous new collection of over 500 birds.

This collection includes sweet Victorian greeting cards, pretty watercolors, and a great selection of antique prints. There are whimsical and humorous birds as well as detailed realistic nature prints. Bird eggs, too! ALL 300 DPI and ready to print.

DETAILS AND SAMPLE IMAGES HERE

This image CD includes 100 Audubon birds in a size appropriate for card making, altered art, etc., but if you want large Audubon prints suitable for framing, see my post earlier this month about our Birds of America 2-CD Set!

By Request: Floral Inchie Circles

A very special new collage sheet design featuring beautiful flower images in a variety of styles from traditional Victorian roses and violets to art deco lilies and vines. When you print this sheet at full size (letter size 8.5x11) the circles will be 1-inch diameter, but of course one advantage of our digital collage sheets is that you can print them smaller for smaller images as desired.

Check it out! Another Lunagirl original available only at http://www.lunagirl.com/

NEW Botanical Flower Prints!

We have been working on several collections of antique prints, and here is the latest: A fine collection of floral botanical prints.

These are digitized and ready to print, and they in a larger size and high resolution to create large prints! So artists and crafters can resize these lovely flower and plant images to smaller sizes for craft projects and card making, but you can also create gorgeous larger botanical prints ready to frame for your home, office, etc!

CLICK HERE to see more.

Spring on the way! Free image!

Spring doesn't officially arrive for about 3 more weeks, but you can't tell it today here in Tennessee. There's a bright blue sky, a strong gusty breeze, and predicted high in the 70s! Birdsong greets me when I step outside (along with the wind!). The goldfinches are pairing up, the males turning brighter yellow. I've seen a wren looking for a nesting spot, and soon there will be bluebirds doing the same.

All this spring energy has inspired a Happy Monday free image from Lunagirl. To enjoy for your personal projects: Yellow daffodils, the heralds of spring on the way!

Resource: Fresh Flower Scans

As spring approaches, I wanted to again share this site that offers scans of fresh flowers.

They are free for personal use in your art and crafts projects. He even offers a tutorial on scanning your own flowers! These would be lovely in collage, decoupage or scrapbooks, or as backgrounds or transparencies for altered art projects.


For Victorian flower art & illustration plus hundreds of Lunagirl vintage bird pictures, visit here to see our Lunagirl Victorian Flowers & Birds on CD!