My new collection

Every year, I wait for the calendars to go on sale in January, and then snap up 5 or 6 of them for our home and offices. But in 2003, I fell in love with some fancy ones at the paper store, and splurged on full price calendars in September. Vintage travel posters for me, and Kawase Hasui prints for him.

After the year ended, I hung on to the calendars and rotated through my favorite prints. A few weeks ago I noticed Jo-Ann was having a big sale on their poster frames, so I measured my calendars and got frames for all my favorites. These wooden 12" x 16" (about 300 x 400 mm) frames were just $9.99 each:



I knew the prints weren't going to fit just right in the frames, but it was a great excuse to go buy some of those gorgeous sheets from the paper store to cover up the holes at the top of the page: .
and to cover up the text at the bottom of the page:

It took a couple of hours of careful measuring and cutting for me to make the first "mat," but I'm not loving the black color.

What do you think? Should I replace the black stripes with a beige print?

The black paper cost only $3.50 for a huge sheet, and if I don't use it to mat these prints, I can use it on another craft project. The travel prints will hang in our guest bedroom (also known as Libby's nap room), next to an authentic vintage travel poster and a few travel souveniers.

After I get the travel prints in their frames, I'm going to pick out some Japanese paper to mat the Kawase Hasui prints.