Handmade Greeting Card From Upcycled Picture Postcard

I love to look at old picture postcards. I like to look at the pictures and read the descriptions on the back.
If the card was used, I enjoy reading the message and looking at the stamp and post mark. I think there is a great deal of history that can be preserved from old postcards.
I recently bought a lot of old postcards from the early 1900s at a garage sale. Each postcard was stored in a zip-lock baggie. Some of the postcards were damaged and torn but the pieces were saved in the baggies.
This postcard that featured the head of a horse was in five pieces. The largest piece had a tear right through the middle. The date on the back of the card was 1908.  I decided to try to restore the picture and use it for a greeting card.

This is how I made the card;
(1.) I started with a blank kraft cardstock greeting card that measures 5" by 6 1/2".
(2.) I used some Elmer's Craft Bond Rubber Cement to glue the patterned paper and cardboard to the front of the card.
(3.) I carefully applied the rubber cement to the back of the postcard to seal the large tear in the center of the card and a smaller tear on the bottom edge of the card.
(4.) I applied a thin coat of Matte Collage Pauge Decoupage sealer to the front of the card and let it dry.
(5.) I used glue dots to attach the postcard to the front of the greeting card.

This beautiful 1908 horse image will now bring enjoyment to the person who receives this card.

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Jack And The Beanstalk

Do you remember the story of Jack and the Beanstalk?

Jack is a young boy living with his widowed mother. Their only means of income is a cow. When this cow stops giving milk, Jack is sent to the market to sell it. On the way to the market he meets an old man who offers to give him "magic" beans in exchange for the cow.

Jack takes the beans but when he arrives home without money, his mother becomes furious and throws the beans out the window and sends Jack to bed without supper.

As Jack sleeps, the beans grow into a gigantic beanstalk. Jack climbs the beanstalk and arrives in a land high up in the sky where he follows a road to a house, which is the home of a giant. He enters the house and asks the giant's wife for food. She gives him food, but the giant returns and senses that a human is nearby:

Fee-fi-fo-fum!

I smell the blood of an Englishman.

Be he live, or be he dead,

I'll grind his bones to make my bread.

However, Jack is hidden by the giant's wife and overhears the giant counting his money. Jack steals a bag of gold coins as he makes his escape down the beanstalk.

Jack repeats his journey up the beanstalk two more times, each time he is helped by the increasingly suspicious wife of the giant and narrowly escapes with one of the giant's treasures. The second time, he steals a hen which laid golden eggs and the third time a magical harp that played by itself. This time, he is almost caught by the giant who follows him down the beanstalk. Jack calls his mother for an axe and chops the beanstalk down, killing the giant. The end of the story has Jack and his mother living happily ever after with their new riches.

I think there are several life lessons in this folktale. Jack accepted the bag of  beans from the old man but his mother thought they were worthless. She never dreamed that the beans were truly magic and her brave son would use this opportunity to change their lives forever.

We should be thankful for the opportunities that we are given. We may not be able to see their value at the time, but they might lead to positive changes for us in the future.

I made this handmade greeting card for Challenge #142 - Anything Goes With/ Mo Image. I used the digital image They Grow So Fast from Mo's Digital Pencil Shop. I printed it on kraft cardstock and colored it with Prismacolor pencils. I used a vintage picture postcard for the background.

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