French Ephemera Swap Page

I recently participated in a French Ephemera Swap on my Marie Antoinette Mail Art group.  I mailed kits of material, like ribbon roses, lace, fabric, images and more to two different partners (mine were Rhonda and Cathy.)  Then they each mailed me a kit also.

Then we were supposed to use our kits to create a Marie book.  It's been fun opening and reopening my boxes and reveling in the pretties, but I finally sat down and did my first page.  I'm sure the book in it's entirety would have a much more stunning effect, but I could not wait to share this.  :0)

Here is the front: 

I couldn't decide between a paper and chipboard or soft textile pages.  I was dying to try a fabric book, but Rhonda had sent me loads of beautiful paper ephemera.  Eventually I decided to go for it with a mixture of both.  The grey and cream fabric from Rhonda made for a perfect start.

I glued both this paper gardenia (from Cathy) and the paper image of Marie right down to my fabric with Beacon's 3 in1 glue.  I was a bit nervous about possibly destroying the fabric, but it worked perfectly.

A pretty ribbon rose and buttons from Rhonda gave my page the perfect touch.

A peek at the cool script fabric underneath the lace.

In order to make the quilting work I had to do the back side at the same time as the front.  So here is what I came up with: 

I added the pink background fabric, but everything else was from my two partners.

Rhonda sent the rose fabric (cut all cute with pinking shears) and the image, and Cathy sent the cool organza bag which I made into a see-through pocket.

  

Boy, I sure had fun with this.  The next page I do will be a paper chipboard page.  Stay tuned.  :)