Colouring Books and Envelopes, Part 2

     Last month you may remember me writing about colouring books and envelopes. Well, if you enjoyed that post – good news! Today I’ll be looking at more envelopes I’ve made and decorated using a colouring book.

     This is the colouring book in question (don’t worry, it doesn’t come falling apart like this, I just only remembered to take a picture after I’d started ripping it up!). I bought it in Easons (or, as the shop is actually called, Eason, but who calls it that? I always add the ‘s’, it sounds better and I type as I talk). Anyway, this is a really nice colouring book. To start with, it only cost me €5 and who doesn’t love when things are that cheap! It’s quite a thick colouring book as well so plenty of pages and the paper is sturdy so good for envelopes. I bought the nature themed book but there was also a city themed one and a tattoo themed one, both also €5.

     So that’s the book I used for all of the envelopes coming up. To note, I haven’t coloured any of these in – the green coloured in and the spots are part of the designs.

     To start with, I just ripped the book up to make getting all the pages out easier. Pretty much every page in this book is suitable to envelope making or decorating. On the left above are just a few pages from the book and on the right are a few envelopes I made from the pages (using the method I mentioned in this post for making envelopes). Fold the paper to best showcase the art, make a few snips and stick together and in a matter of minutes you can have a lovely variety of envelopes.

     Here’s one of my favourites that I sent off to the Netherlands last week:

     And here’s a (very friendly, I’m sure) snake:

     You can do more than just making an envelope out of the entire page though. Cutting out some of the smaller images is a great way to build up your paper ephemera collection. Get your scissors, craft knife and cutting mat, pop on a good show and while the hours away.

     I haven’t cut these images to size yet but just look at how good they look against a brown envelope:

Here’s an envelope I sent off last month decorated in a sea theme using some pictures I cut out from the book:

     And finally, here’s more envelopes made and decorated:

     I hope you’ve enjoyed seeing these and they’ve inspired you to go get a colouring book for your mail art. Colouring books are so common and cheap these days that you’ve got no excuses for not getting one! They’re a very cost effective way of getting paper embellishments.