Free Illustrated Template for Cardmaking, Collage, Graphic Design or Junk Journaling: A Little Happier Verse with Poppy Field Decorative Border

This image was extracted from an art nouveau style vintage postcard in my personal collection. The decorative border shows an L-shaped row of stylized red poppies with a lush summer meadow and billowy clouds in the background. On the upper right side of the page is a little verse that says:

“A little happier, a few more friends,
A little richer, In the blessings Heaven sends...”
I think this would make a wonderful background for a journal or scrapbooking page but you could also use it in a greeting card project. You can download the high-res 12" x 12" @ 300 ppi JPEG here.

Here is a New Year card I made with it:

Happy New Year of the Rabbit 2023!


All pre-made templates by FieldandGarden.com are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Please credit and link back to FieldandGarden.com as your source if you use or share this work.

My Photo Journal: Buddleia 'Grand Cascade' and a Common Buckeye Butterfly

Look deep into nature and you will understand everything better.
― Albert Einstein
It's been a while since I attempted to make any gardening notes - it always seems so overwhelming on top of tending to the garden itself. However, I have resolved to keep more conscientous observations about what I have planted in the garden and how these plantings do over the year and hopefully, in years to come.

Here to kick things off is a Buddleia 'Grand Cascade' that was introduced to the back garden in 2022:

Now, even though the tag says full sun, I have had some success with butterfly bushes in partial shade before. This shrub was planted in a full sun to part shade location, and I have to say I was quite happy with the first season progress that it made.

It started producing masses of flower buds beginning of August, and boy, did it attract a ton of butterflies when it started blooming profusely in late August. It continued to flower vigorously into early November when it started getting brown and done. I feel that my flowers came out looking more pink than lavender (see first picture at top of page) but that might have something to do with the quality of the light when I took the photo ― late summer afternoon, deep shade. Despite the profusion of blooms, I must admit the perfume was quite underwhelming ― the scent is a lot more subtle than any other butterfly bush I've ever planted.

I garden in a Zone 5B and it's been a fairly mild winter so far so I am keeping my fingers crossed that the Grande Cascade will shower me with more love next year. However, just to be safe, I did mulch about 4 inches thick and piled bags of unopened compost all around the bottom part of the shrub to provide a bit of a wind break as well as additional warmth to the surrounding soil.

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By the way, here are a couple of photos from the Walters Gardens site to show you how large this perennial shrub can grow. You can also find descriptions of the plant on their site. [Images below belong to Walters Gardens.]

Vintage Art Appreciation: The Quiet of the Lake, Roundhay Park by John Atkinson Grimshaw

The Quiet of the Lake, Roundhay Park, 1870
by John Atkinson Grimshaw (1836 - 1893)
You cannot wait for an untroubled world to have an untroubled moment. The terrible phone call, the rainstorm, the sinister knock on the door—they will all come. Soon enough arrive the treacherous villain and the unfair trial and the smoke and the flames of the suspicious fires to burn everything away. In the meantime, it is best to grab what wonderful moments you find lying around.
― Lemony Snicket, Shouldn't You Be in School?

Therefore, dear Sir, love your solitude and try to sing out with the pain it causes you. For those who are near you are far away... and this shows that the space around you is beginning to grow vast.... be happy about your growth, in which of course you can't take anyone with you, and be gentle with those who stay behind; be confident and calm in front of them and don't torment them with your doubts and don't frighten them with your faith or joy, which they wouldn't be able to comprehend. Seek out some simple and true feeling of what you have in common with them, which doesn't necessarily have to alter when you yourself change again and again; when you see them, love life in a form that is not your own and be indulgent toward those who are growing old, who are afraid of the aloneness that you trust.... and don't expect any understanding; but believe in a love that is being stored up for you like an inheritance, and have faith that in this love there is a strength and a blessing so large that you can travel as far as you wish without having to step outside it.
― Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

I find it wholesome to be alone the greater part of the time. To be in company, even with the best, is soon wearisome and dissipating. I love to be alone. I never found the companion that was so companionable as solitude.
― Henry David Thoreau, Walden

Free Vintage Winter Clipart and Nature Poem for Cardmaking, Crafts or Junk Journaling: Snow Crystals, 1881 and Snowflakes, 1879

Above is a black and white illustration from an 1881 magazine thats a variety of snow crystal shapes. I also found a sweet winter poem called "Snowflakes" written by Mary Mapes Dodge (1831 - 1905) and first published in 1879 that I thought would go well with the illustration. Here is how the poem goes:

Whenever a snowflake leaves the sky
It turns and turns to say “good-bye;”
“Good-bye, dear cloud, so cool and gray!”
Then lightly travels on its way.
And when a snowflake finds a tree,
“Good-day,” it says — “Good-day to thee!
Thou art so bare and lonely, dear,
I’ll rest and call my comrades here.”
But when a snowflake brave and meek,
Lights on a rosy maiden’s cheek,
It starts— “How warm and soft the day!
‘Tis Summer!”— and it melts away.
[Source]
You can download the free illustration as a high-resolution 5" x 7" @ 300 ppi JPEG without a watermark here. Perfect for a holiday greeting card or incorporate into crafts, scrapbooking or junk journal projects.

By the way, here is an audio of soprano Gwen Catley singing "Snowflakes," which had been set to music by composer Liza Lehmann (1862 - 1918), and published in 1914. [Source]



From my personal collection of ephemera. All digital scans by FieldandGarden.com are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. Please credit and link back to FieldandGarden.com as your source if you use or share this work.