Friday, November 7, 2014

Library Card Pocket Ornament

Since I've decided to do a smallish book-themed tree in addition to our regular Christmas trees, I've been experimenting with various ideas for ornaments to put on it. This one makes me extremely happy.



How fun! I'm going to have to make more, with Christmas-themed book titles. Unfortunately, this old SU library card stamp doesn't give much room for a title. I'll just have to do the best I can and thank goodness that I've have this teeny alphabet set from Papertrey. It's a pain to use because the stamps are so darn tiny, but I gave up trying to line them up on the block and instead stamp each letter individually. In the long run, it's faster and looks better.

My date stamp didn't stamp perfectly, but how many times did the librarian stamp crooked or just like I did? In my experience...all the time.

The pocket template is of my own making to fit the SU library card stamp...and leave a little extra on the top for the eyelet. I just googled "library pocket template," saw the basic idea in the Images at the top of the page, and went for it. It's pretty easy!

BTW, did you know that my first job as a work-study student (1984-85) was ordering and filing cards in the card catalog at Duke University's Perkins Library? Those were the days.

Source


Oh, yeah. I feel old.

Supplies
stamps: Papertrey Simple Alphabet, SU set that I broke up years ago
ink: Memento, Hero Arts
paper: Papertrey
accessories: eyelet, baker's twine, corner rounder, Scor-Pal

9 comments:

  1. Bwhahahaha! This is how I got through college.

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  2. Cute idea! I'm also prehistoric .... used cards when at university!

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  3. I remember that prehistoric googling technique. ha. I love this idea. Smart Susan.

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  4. Ahhhh, those were the days! One of my first jobs in a library involved card catalogues, Jo x

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  5. Oh my. As a retired high school librarian, I remember well the catalog cards, card catalog, book cards and pockets! The title line on a book card never seemed long enough to TYPE the title and lining up the card in the TYPEWRITER was a challenge. The best memories are preprinted catalog cards and the change to an automated catalog! Obviously, I love your book-related Christmas tree.

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  6. I forgot-- the Prehistoric Googling picture reminded me of a t-shirt I had with "Librarian: the original search engine" on the front.

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  7. My first job was also at a library - when I was in high school! How I loved and still love libraries. Would really love one of those card catalog systems to house some of my crafting supplies! Sigh...

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  8. Thank you for the blast from the past and my morning laugh!

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  9. Love your ornament! I'm our church's librarian, and remember well the days of having to stamp books "out" - now we're all computerized... I do still have a stash of cards and their matching envelope pockets - I'll have to see if they can be worked into something useful!
    I also was also blessed to receive our high school's oak card catalogue drawers - I use it for storing my ink pads.

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Thank you so much for taking time to comment!