Every year I mean to send Christmas cards. And every year I miss the boat. This year I got a little clever and sent an e-card. It was fun, but not nearly as satisfying as knowing you’ve sent real mail.

So this year I got it in my head that it was totally okay that I flaked on sending Christmas cards because I could send postcards for Paddy’s Day! It works especially well because we live here in Dublin and I feel like it’s a holiday we have a ton of credibility for with American friends, but I think it would work well for anyone with a little Irish pride!

It’s a sweet and simple way to brighten up March!

I carved a simple shamrock with three leaves from a piece of rubber stamp material using a lino cutting tool. You could probably use an Xacto knife and a rubber stamp or even a paring knife and a potato!

I used a silvery gold stamp because I’m not so fond of things that are overly St. Patrick’s Day themed. I wanted a more subtle effect.

Then I used little letter stamps to write out dia duit, which is hello in Irish. It’s pronounced dee-ya gwitch. At least according to my husband who’s a guidance counselor in an Irish speaking school. I figure he can be our authority for this project.

(Aren’t my real shamrocks sweet? We have three plants outside our front door!)

Then I just flipped over the piece of card and created a postcard template to write on, including space for the address and a stamp.

And now you can send sweet Paddy’s Day greetings around the world! Enjoy!

Good morning, friends! I had every intention of telling you all about my weekend yesterday, but then my weekend just didn’t stop! Monday was just as packed as the other two days as I tried to use up every minute before heading back to work today.

But I think you’ll forgive me because I have lots of fun posts planned for this week. So without further ado, a new and easy way to frame artwork.

For the last year or so, we’ve had these white frames on the wall in our front room. Because you have to walk through the front room to get to the rest of the house, it serves as kind of an entryway/landing strip/storage space. For the last year, the white frames have looked like this:

Big frames with little frames hanging inside on colored ribbons. They looked sweet, but a little blah. When I found these lobster tea towels at the Maine Pantry in Portland during my visit last November, I thought they’d make a great update.

I think I found these particular frames by the side of the road and the glass was long gone. And I didn’t really like the idea of trying to properly frame the tea towels or even trying to wrap them around cardboard and fit them in.

Enter foam core and pretty pins. I cut two pieces of foam core (which is just poster board with foam in the middle) down to fit the frames and hot glued them in so they would sit flush with the edge of the frames. Then I cut the tea towels down to size and pinned them into the foam core with pretty colored pins. (Try these pins – the little balls on the ends are different colors. I have the red book and it was a gift from a sweet friend!)

I love this new system for three reasons. First, if I get sick of the lobsters (which I don’t think I will any time soon!), I can swap them out for another set of tea towels or prints or artwork. Second, it was fast and cheap. Even though foam core is expensive in this country, the whole project probably cost me €20, including the tea towels!

Lastly, I really like how they almost look like laundry hanging on a line. For that reason, I chose not to iron the tea towels. I was going for a rustic look and it has absolutely nothing to do with how much I hate ironing.

How’s that for a little Tuesday trick? Oh, and also. How cute are those lobsters? It’s like they’re greeting me with a happy dance every time I walk in the front door!