Illustrated Template for Announcements, Invitations, Journaling and Various Other Design Projects: At the End of the Lane

Exploring is delightful to look forward to and back upon, but it is not comfortable at the time, unless it be of such an easy nature as not to deserve the name.
― Samuel Butler, Erewhon

Go outside. Don’t tell anyone and don’t bring your phone. Start walking and keep walking until you no longer know the road like the palm of your hand, because we walk the same roads day in and day out, to the bus and back home and we cease to see. We walk in our sleep and teach our muscles to work without thinking and I dare you to walk where you have not yet walked and I dare you to notice. Don’t try to get anything out of it, because you won’t. Don’t try to make use of it, because you can’t. And that’s the point. Just walk, see, sit down if you like. And be. Just be, whatever you are with whatever you have, and realise that that is enough to be happy.

There’s a whole world out there, right outside your window. You’d be a fool to miss it.
― Charlotte Eriksson, You're Doing Just Fine

Late 19th century illustration of a Victorian lady who has come to end of a fenced lane on one her walks. In the background you can see that she has come a long way with open sky, large field and tall trees framing the scene. Can be used for announcemnts, invitations, journaling and various other design projects. High-res 5.5” x 9.5” @ 300 ppi JPEG without any words/watermark can be found here.


From my personal collection of ephemera. These images are to be incorporated into your creative works. Not for resale “as-is.”

Printable Vintage Art: Girl and Bluebells, Brighouse Bay by Edward Atkinson Hornel

Girl and Bluebells, Brighouse Bay, 1919
by Edward Atkinson Hornel (1864–1933)

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We need the tonic of wildness...At the same time that we are earnest to explore and learn all things, we require that all things be mysterious and unexplorable, that land and sea be indefinitely wild, unsurveyed and unfathomed by us because unfathomable. We can never have enough of nature.
― Henry David Thoreau, Walden: Or, Life in the Woods

We could never have loved the earth so well if we had had no childhood in it, if it were not the earth where the same flowers come up again every spring that we used to gather with our tiny fingers as we sat lisping to ourselves on the grass, the same hips and haws on the autumn hedgerows, the same redbreasts that we used to call ‘God’s birds’ because they did no harm to the precious crops. What novelty is worth that sweet monotony where everything is known and loved because it is known?
― George Eliot, The Mill on the Floss

You can download a digitally enhanced version of the vintage painting (as seen above) as a high-res 9” x 6” @ 300 ppi JPEG here.


Digitally enhanced reproductions of public domain fine art are shared under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Printable Vintage Art and Nature-Themed Lullaby: Around the Evening Lamp and In Gold and Purple

Evening you gather back
all that dazzling dawn has put asunder:
you gather a lamb, gather a kid,
gather a child to its mother.
― Sappho

Sleep my little baby-oh
Sleep until you waken
When you wake you'll see the world
If I'm not mistaken...

Kiss a lover
Dance a measure,
Find your name
And buried treasure...

Face your life
Its pain,
Its pleasure,
Leave no path untaken.
― Neil Gaiman, The Graveyard Book

The above watercolour, titled “Around the Evening Lamp,” was painted by Carl Larsson (1853–1919) in 1900. Doesn't the vase of blooming poppies in the middle of the dining table make an absolutely stunning centrepiece? I thought it was clever to incoirporate the flowers into a twilight painting since poppies have traditionally been associated with sleep and dreams. I found the original work a bit cold (I think it was meant to represent a winter scene) so I warmed up the colours in my digitally enhanced version. If you like, you can download my version as a high-res, printable 9.5” x 11” @ 300 ppi JPEG here.


Digitally enhanced reproductions of public domain fine art are shared under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
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Since we are exploring themes of rest and sleep, I thought I would include this antique nature-themed lullaby with an illustration of a mother cradling a sleepy child on a porch with the setting sun in the background. Called “In Gold and Purple,” this work was first published in 1888 with words by Marian Fairlamb and music arranged by J. Remington Fairlamb, once an American Consul appointed by President Abraham Lincoln to a post in Zurich. The 8” x 11” @ 300 ppi JPEG of the lullaby can be found without a watermark here.

In gold and purple the sky is dressed, Bye, baby, bye!
The sun has sunk to his bed in the west, Bye, baby, bye!
And stars peep out to say “Good-night,”
To dear little baby all robed in white,
My baby whose golden locks shine in the light, Bye, baby, bye!

The trees are chanting a slumber song, Bye, baby, bye!
In time with the brook as it purls along, Bye, baby, bye!
The mother bird gathers its fledgings to rest,
And flutters above them all warm in their nest,
And baby's head lies on mother's breast, Bye, baby, bye!

My baby in slumberland soon will rest, Bye, baby, bye!
With visions in gold and purple blest, Bye, baby, bye!
Where skies are more fair and trees more green
Than anything mortal has ever seen,
But baby the brightest of all, I ween, Bye, baby, bye!

My baby's eyes are closing fast, Bye, baby, bye!
To weary limbs rest has come at last, Bye, baby, bye!
An angel stoops and kisses the face,
And baby smiles with cherubic grace,
And heav'nly light transfigures the place, Bye, baby, bye!


Antique nature lullaby is from my personal collection of ephemera. It can be incorporated into your creative works but is not for resale “as-is.” Credit to FieldandGarden.com appreciated but not required.