Keyhole Alice Postcards (DIY)

This weekend I went to the Michigan Postcrossing Meet Up at the Amway Grand Hotel here in Grand Rapids.  This is my second meet up, and its really fun to chat with other people that love mail and collecting postcards.  Members came from different parts of Michigan and Illinois.

  This is our group in front of a fountain inside the hotel.

For the meet, I made a special Michigan postcard with wild animals (thanks Molly for printing them, you are awesome!) and info about our meet up on the other side. 

The design was inspired by Nouvellesimages, a French company that produces cards featuring collections of things (such as different fruits or designer chairs). 

After signing and stamping dozens of postcards, we traded from our own collections and then searched through the downtown gift shops to find even more.  Sadly, most of my postcards are in the studio closet and I'm afraid to open the door with all of the foster kittens around.  I worry that one of them will get lost in there and never come out, so I didn't bring many to trade this year.  

Here's one of my favorite Nouvelles cards:

And this is how I'm greeted every time I open the door to my studio.  

All they want to do is climb my legs and bite me or escape.  

They're like cute little zombies.

Because I love making things, I made up a drawing for a set of handmade postcards.  

The winner, KuchikiRukia (that's her screen name on the website) loves Alice in Wonderland, so I created these cards especially for her.

The images were taken from an old, very worn children's book found at Goodwill.  

With Photoshop, I made a Victorian key and keyhole stencil. 

Each key and keyhole design was carefully cut with an x-acto knife and a hole punch, then spray mounted to a postcard with a quick note about the book about the book printed on the other side.  

If you'd like to make your own keyhole cards, just print the stencil (below) and cut out with an x-acto knife.  If that's too much work for you, I have two sets for sale on Etsy (and don't forget about the 20% off coupon code for cool people that follow my blog: BLOG20PERCENT)