Books – Page 2 – Karla's Cottage

Baby Books for the Butterballs

Books, dogs, drawing, Goldendoodle Puppies, Hand painted, puppies!

By Karla Nathan / October 1, 2020

I have almost finished the first litter’s baby books. The finishing touches will be a photo on the front, and notes about the puppy on the inside.

As well as a 30 day free trial of insurance tucked into the back pocket of the book.

Now that the pups are older, I am telling them apart easier. But that first week? My head was spinning just trying to see who was who to get their weight charts started.

So, I had sketches and notes for each one. Someone suggested that they would make good gifts for the new owners, and I agreed. Since I needed to keep track of info about each pup, I decided to make the paintings into books.

I’ll have the weights and worming/shots schedule in there too.

The paper features honey bees for the puppies’ mom, Honey.

I bought supplies to make them for The Sugarbabies too. Hers has black and white hearts.

The books can be displayed with the painting showing like this. And there is space for the new family to add photos too.

Bluebird’s Song sign up and details

bird song art event, Books, Workshops

By Karla Nathan / March 3, 2020

Join us in Kansas, somewhere over the rainbow, where happy little bluebirds fly, and beautiful dreams come true, for classes with Lesa Dailey and myself. Our time will include 2 lunches, lots of treats, and a happy hour party.

This class is limited in size to the amount of vintage albums I have to craft into art journals. No two books are alike, so the selecting of covers will be chosen by guests in the order of class sign ups.

We will be using The Good Stuff, lots of lovely ephemera to create a personalized, one of a kind book.

Lesa will be leading us in making one of her delightful birds. Here are photos of birds I have gotten from her, not the pictures of what she will be teaching. I will let you know as soon as she gets a sample to me.

I do not tell Lesa what to make, she is a designing genius and I leave it up to her!

This will be my project for Sunday. Although I have to warn you, all will differ, as I am using old books to build the kits.

I will provide a very, very vintage album, disassembled, painted, waxed, and buffed, ready for you to craft into a book. I have many old albums, in different styles, and choice of the books will be in order of sign ups.

Also, if you would rather have a book cover as is, no paint, please request that ahead of time, so I can leave some plain.

Each kit will be of equal value and style, but they will vary according to the book itself.

Lesa's class will be most of the day Saturday, with a break for lunch.

Then in the later part of the afternoon, we will have some fairy fun, with happy hour crafting. There will be a special Bluebird Sangria, and blue fairies with some tasty snacks.

If you prefer to make a fairy from a picture of someone you love or of yourself, I can edit a photo for you. Or you can choose from a collage sheet that I will provide. Your fairy can hang, or be used in your book.

Your art journal kit will include pre-folded and prepped pages, ready to tie in, and vintage mats to use for collage or to frame a picture. I'm doing the boring part ahead for you, so you will have all the pieces ready to assemble, and have time left over to decorate interior pages.

You will get:

Prepped covers from a vintage album
Prepped pages and ribbons cut to tie them in
Lovely laces to trim and embellish the cover
Buttons, rhinestones, and velvet ribbon
A soft, old millinery bloom
A painted key
Seam binding, netting, and other trims
An ephemera pack
Vintage wallpaper
An old photo
Bird images

I am cutting apart a treasured, hand pieced tablecloth of netting and old lace, everyone will get a section of this to use.

As well as gorgeous bridal lace with sparkling sequins and beads.

Cost will be $350 and can be split into two payments completed by May 1.

I will keep track of the order in which you respond, and that will determine who gets which album to work with.

Please email at

Karlanathan@sbcglobal.net

to ask for a paypal invoice or an address to mail a check.

Refund policy- Kits will be sent to you at a cost of $65 for Lesa's, $80 for the book, and $25 for the fairy plus postage, and the rest refunded in full. I know that many are worried about upcoming travel restrictions and wanted to make sure you were covered if that occurs. If you can't come to the class, you will at least have a project mailed to you to work on at home.

Our gathering is held during KCMO’s First Friday weekends, so you might want to treat yourself to shopping at the fabulous Old West Bottoms Antique District on Friday while in the area.

PS- I will be having surgery on Friday March 6, so please understand if I don't get back to you right away. Emails will be answered in the order they come in for sign ups. Thank you!!

Here are some of the albums I have that are in the original condition.

There are various colors and styles, all quite lovely. Some are velvet, some celluloid, some leather.

When I paint the red velvet ones, they turn a pretty color of pink.

This is Lesa's project from A Snowbird's Song last November.

I will leave you with some close ups of the album covers.

Here is one that I turned into an updated photo album that was left as is.

And this one was painted.

All are slightly damaged and tattered due to age. I look at that as an opportunity to use more lace on them!

A peek inside my Parisian Travel Journal

Books, Workshops

By Karla Nathan / February 18, 2020

No, my camping trip wasn’t to Paris…but I still worked on pages in my Paris themed journal.

The books themselves are what I will be making for my class at a Midnight in Paris.

I don’t know if there will be time to work on the interiors of the books during class, but I wanted to have some examples of what it could possibly be used for.

It will be more of an art journal than travel journal for me.

But of course, they can be used in anyway the students would like.

I simply enjoy working on pages, no matter what the theme or use of the book will be.

But day dreaming of a trip to Paris is always fun to do.

A Parisian Travel Journal

Books, guncles, Workshops

By Karla Nathan / January 27, 2020

I am very happy to be teaching at Randy Nathan’s first event!

The theme is A Midnight in Paris, so I have crafted a travel journal that is all frenchied up for us to make there.

And of course, it comes with a collage sheet of French images so you can personalize your book by choosing which pictures you want to use.

I have used Toile de Joie wallpaper, Fleur de lis charms, silk ribbon, and a metal spine inspired by the Eiffel Tower.

I would love to have you join us!

Valentine Fairies and more

Books, fairies, the Boutique at Karla's Cottage, vintage paper/collage art

By Karla Nathan / January 6, 2020

Thank you so much to everyone who purchased fairies from me for their Christmas tree!

I loved making each and every one.

But just because Christmas season has passed, that doesn't have to mean that fairy season is over.

These sprites are lovely for Valentines Day too.

Especially this gal.

She wants to be your Galentine.

I have given many of them hand drawn roses or hearts on their clothes.

While they look extra cute in pink for the holiday, they aren't necessarily just for Valentines.

Although they would make nice gifts for someone you love.

And the fairies, with or without a book are sweet as candy year round.

I love any excuse to make one.

There are more to come too. I have more to get pics of.

It is much more fun to make them than it is to photograph them, edit the pictures and list them in the Boutique.

I adore making books, and making fairies, so I figured I would combine my loves and put them together. Maybe I will make some sweet banners also since I love those too…

The books are 100% handmade, cover to cover. I used acrylic pour paint canvases, cut up to cover chipboard to hand craft them. Cut and tied the pages in, lined the covers with vintage wallpaper, created ties to hold the books closed, then decorated them.

If you would like one, you can find them here in my Boutique.

More sewing?? Yep, another shirt!

Books, friends, sewing?

By Karla Nathan / July 16, 2019

Some long time friends, and Birdsong Peeps, suggested that we do a "boho" clothing workshop.

I am NOT a sewer, but was ready to tackle the shirt project that Lorrie Scott had featured in the Gilded Journey

But, it turns out, I didn't have to. Sweet Nora loves to sew, and happily did about 90% of the job for me. What a nice surprise!!

I had cut up two of my husband's old shirts and was going to sew them together as the directions layed out, but Nora went a step further and custom fitted the pieces to me so that the duster was exactly my size.

I made some pockets and had vintage lace ready to add.

But she did all of the hard parts.

Tami had brought some sewing to do too, she was adding doilies to a runner.

A lot of the day was spent in me looking for the pile of mother of pearl buttons that I had set aside to add to the shirt. I swear, sometimes my studio is a black hole. I set something down and -poof!- gone.

Finally, I gave up and dug out more buttons to use instead. I added them to the duster and felt like I had made a major accomplishment, since I am not a thread and needle person. Thanks to Nora, I only did the minor jobs on the piece, she whipped it up and made it wonderful!

What a nice day.

If you'd like to turn two, old shirts into one amazing duster, you can find the instructions in this beautiful book. Oh, and by the way? I have a chapter in the book too. My story is about crafting a travel journal. The book is just lovely, and I hope to make many more of the projects inside.

More books? Why yes!

Books, paintings

By Karla Nathan / April 2, 2019

While I was on a roll with book making… I just kept on a going.

I have soft, Easter colors like pink…

Ocean and mermaid tones….

And soft grays (with more pink!).

But these are not all, I still have a stack on my desk. I think I will transform one into a travel journal for myself.

Paint pour tag books

Books, paintings

By Karla Nathan / March 30, 2019

Remember my months long obsession with acrylic paint pouring? I still LOVE it, but put the supplies aside for the winter, because I needed to reclaim the garage I'd been working in. During my dream state of making one canvas after another, I also painted on some tags. These were used to make a couple of books.

And since I love playing with wallpaper too, I covered the interior of one of them.

These are going to be on my vendor table at Once Upon an Easter. I am bringing SO MUCH STUFF, that I know I will never sell it all, so I should be listing some stuff to sell in my Boutique when I get home and settled.

A Lovebird’s Song book for Beth

bird song art event, Books, Workshops

By Karla Nathan / January 13, 2019

I've been busy as can be, putting kits together for not one but two classes, here at the cottage on Jan. 26 and in Florida at Karen's on Feb. 16th.

Actually, it ends up being 4 classes, two on each day. And I wanted to switch up this "Pages Through Time" autograph book a little bit for the workshop at my home. So, I've made an example of it with the slight changes. The pictured one is just a little thicker than the actual pattern will be, since this book goes to my BFF, Beth. She is going to help out that day and is going to work on the premade book, creating examples of interior pages for the other attendees.

I'm looking forward to seeing what she comes up with. I always learn good tricks from her!

A Book Club Christmas party

Books, cottage, holiday decor, We're having a party

By Karla Nathan / December 16, 2018

I couldn't remember if it was my 4th or 5th annual holiday book club party, so I looked back at my blog (which is my journal, and the only way I ever know when I did what) and saw that I'd started hosting these in 2011!

Here are some past parties:

This year, I was inspired by a pot of glittered, blue poinsettias to tend toward being a little more colorful than the typical gold and white color scheme of past parties. Our white tree has multiple settings for color choices. On a daily basis, I set it on white and twinkling. But the minute Sugarwings walks in the door, she resets it to rainbow. I thought I'd use her favorite setting for this night too.

Aren't the flowers wonderful? I always buy a pot of poinsettias, and try to purchase the one with the most blooms, and normally choose ones with just white. This year, I saw a glittered, ocean blue plant, and had to go for it. Especially since it had over a dozen flowers on it. (or to be correct, I think you are supposed to say "brackets" for these plants, not flowers, right?)

I always cut the blooms off and put them in vases, instead of leaving the plant as is. They last quite a long time and I can spread them around the house, using them in many spots.

And lately, I"ve been finding crystal wine glasses on sale for pretty cheap and they have been multicolored too. So, heck why not go with it? It ended up being a change that I really enjoyed.

I even added some pink and blue shiny brites to the gold and silver ones on the chandelier for the night and like it so much, I've leaving them for the season. They look nice with Sugarwings' favorite light setting on the tree, too.

Since the party was for the book club, I added some vintage books to the tablescape.

Dinner was a rainbow spiral pie (that suited the colorful room, didn't it?), baked parmesan chicken, greenbeans with potatoes and mushrooms.

And two kinds of homemade bread.

I had such a lovely time with these bright and interesting ladies.

After dinner, we draw names for gift wrapped, used books that everyone brings to swap.

I ended the night, looking around the room, and enjoying how clean and festive the house looked. I adore the holiday decorations and seeing all of the lights, but our cottage isn't always as tidy as it should be.

While decking the halls, I do a deep cleaning and at first everything looks sparkly and spiffy. Since I do the decorating early, messes have a chance to encroach December passes and having a party midway through the month is a great excuse to get a fresh start and bring back that sparkling feeling. It isn't often that the whole place is all cleaned up and shiny at the same time. We have 5 dogs, heat with wood, and have a craftaholic kid who creates clouds of paper flying around her like she is Edward Scisssorhands.

As I said goodnight to my husband, I commented on how happy I was to have had such a pleasant evening and to have clean, pretty surroundings.

Then, I woke up about 1am to a dog crying hysterically to go out. And then to be let right back in. And again a couple of times that night. I drug myself out of bed each time, half awake, not realizing that she had such a tummy ache that she'd made a mess, and paced around, walking through it.

Not so clean anymore….. I didn't even get a full 24 hours of spotlessness.

Mopping and sanitizing after a sick dog isn't nearly as much fun as cleaning and spiffing to get ready for a party.