Paint Chip Moving Cards!

We have been in our new home for just over two months now, and all that time I have been trying to come up with a cute but inexpensive way to announce our new address and phone number to our friends and family.  Then a good friend of mine who knows all about my love for pretty paper and my obsession with painting shared a pin on Pinterest with me that was practically perfect in every way.  A paint strip moving card!   Here is my moving card (with identifying info hidden, of course).

Didn't it turn out sweet?  The inspiration photo was a little different:

I liked it, but I also felt cutting and sliding would get old really quick.  Initially I wanted to print directly onto the paint strips.  I tried a bunch of different strips and they all had the same problem: the ink smeared.  So back to the drawing board.  I'll note that the paint strips were given to me by another dear friend who works for an architectural firm that happened to be cleaning house and was tossing tons of old fan decks - just wanted to make it clear that I did not go into Sherwin Williams or Home Depot and take 100+ paint strips.   Look at all the fan decks!

Here's what I did.

First, I downloaded the little "home sweet new home" with couch motif from Brooklyn Limestone.  She is an amazing graphic designer and is kind enough to post freebie downloads on her blog.  Yay!  Then I uploaded that pdf file into Adobe Illustrator and played around with it and with some fonts.  It took a little trial and error: type, print, hold up to paint strip, make more spaces, print, repeat repeat.  Finally the text looked just how I wanted next to the strips (the flower is hiding our address and phone number).  

I decided to print onto white cardstock, which I would cut down to the same dimensions as the paint chip.  I printed three to a page and then used a paper cutter to trim the pages down to size.  I liked the four large squares in the Ralph Lauren fan deck, so I went with that one.  Then, I bought some simple metal fasteners and used them to tack the moving announcement behind the paint chip.

Finally, I bought some long skinny mailing envelopes from Paper-Source (they're business size but have a different flap, which makes them feel more special), addressed them and sent them on their way.

What do you think?  I'm really happy with how they turned out and love that really, I am only out the cost of stamps and envelopes.  Everyone who knows me well will get a kick out of these when they arrive: what could be more perfect?

See you swoon,