My friend Shirley Tenhover has been collecting Victoriana and vintage paper - among many other things - since the 1960s. Although she has downsized a few times, and moved, and jettisoned some of her collections she seems to have an unending array of paper.
It turns up as notes and cards to friends, on theme-decorated dining tables, in her own crafts and - luckily for me - in my mailbox! Every now and again, I get a surprise package from her new home in North Carolina. It's always thrilling to open.
This week, a selection of beautiful Victorian scraps turned up, along with the Holy Grail of paper collectors these days: Halloween (I'll post those later). The scraps here are about a third of what she sent, there are more butterflies, tiny animals and people, and lots more of the birds, some of which are being turned into a series of small collages already.
It's wonderful to have friends who share their largesse and who, in the process, inspire new work!
