It's a Creative World

Binding my own book

Hi Debbie here with my first attempt at binding a simple note book.

There are loads of instructions on You Tube and this one on Kirstie's handmade home

I have used a mixture of papers, graph paper tracing paper etc.

I started off with 8 sheets of paper and folded them in the middle, I did this four times to create the pages.

I used the graph paper as a template for the holes.

The tutorials are easy to follow for stitching the whole book together.

This is what the finished spine looks like, I'm going to think about the hanging threads (I'm not sure they look tidy enough for me)

I attached two small pieces of leather to tie the book closed.

Try book binding it's lots of fun and you can end up with a fabulous personalised notebook, whatever size you want.

Planning a Holiday ... get 'smashing'

Hello, Dolly here

I have a new project to share that may – or may not – be a great idea to make in readiness for your holidays this year.

I say may or may not, as I am not sure if it is going to work in reality, but it is certainly worth a go.

I am a terrible collector of bits of paper, especially on holiday. Maps, postcards, receipts, restaurant serviettes etc. You name I I hoard it. I have little bags from each holiday stuffed full of treasures I never seem to do anything with.

Inspired by the recent craze for Smash books, but refusing to succumb, I decided to have a go at making my own storage book for a forthcoming holiday.

 

It is quite large – as I knew one of the things I would want to store inside were park maps which are A4 tri fold size. So the book measures 6” x 10”

I cut two pieces of thick chipboard to size and then decorated them. As we have been to the hotel complex before I used a photo of the resort printed on canvas as an inset for the front cover.

 

I distressed the edges, stitched them onto a contrasting paper, also distressed, and then sewed the whole thing onto the background paper before sticking that to the cover.

 

I added some rub on lettering and a dimension sticker. Now honestly – what could be easier than that.

There are 14 inside pages cut from pastel coloured card stock.

 I have gone for a pastel theme throughout as the resort is made up of different ‘villages’ each in its own pastel shades of pale blues, lemons, pinks, mint greens and so on. It’s easy to make it just right for the sort of holiday you are taking; muted tones for a camping trip, sand and sea colours for a beach holiday, bright primaries for a city vacation etc.

 

I used up a lot of papers I would never ever use to make lots of pockets. I had an old pad of pastel plaids I would never scrap with, but they were perfect for this. Much of the paper is going to end up covered with journaling, labels, tickets etc anyway.

 

I made all sorts of pockets. Some are almost whole page pockets to hold large maps and by sticking the same size pocket to the front and back of the cardstock page I could then stitch round on the machine and thus sew both pockets for added strength.

Some pages have smaller pockets and some have no pockets at all but will just have journaling blocks and memorabilia stuck on.

I also used a whole range of envelopes, covered and stamped to be additional pockets.

 

I then stamped a whole load of works and journaling blocks and statements on scraps of card ready to use if needed when I am away.

 

I also produced place labels all colour coordinated from some of the places I knew we would be visiting.

 

I bound the book and then put all the labels plus odds and ends that coordinated like paper clips, brads, stickers an d die cuts into a very smaller Tupperware box. The box is big enough to hold all the items, an ink pad, a small pair of scissors and my glue.

I am really looking forward to adding my ‘hoarded bits of paper’ to my home made smash book at the end of each day and coming home with an organised collection and a nice record of our trip. I always take a journal and we both write about each day whilst we are away and so that journaling will go into the book too.

It should make scrapping the holiday and whole lot easier and should – hopefully – make a nice book in its own right too. We’ll see.

I hope it has inspired you to have a go at making your own smash book for your next holiday or for a particular project like house renovation etc.

Have fun

Dolly x

 

 

 

 

Make your own Tissue Tape

Hi Debbie here with a cheap and cheerful way of making your own tape. I have to thank my friend Linda (Dot) who told me a few weeks ago that Micropore tape could be used to make your own.

I had a huge roll of micropore in my first aid kit (thought no-one will need it that desperately) and started experimenting.

I found that versafine didn't work however I didn't try heat setting it and I was a little impatient.

Black Stazon was the best although I needed to put loads of ink on to make these images.

I do like the way they add a little bit more detail to the "squidge" book I have made.

I'm going to try stamping with different colours and see if heat setting helps.

 Debbie x

Transferring photos to fabric

I have recently finished this little journal for my daughter. It is for her photography ideas and inspirations and she requested some vintage photographs for the cover. It was a good inspiration for me as I have been wanting to try out this technique for a while now. Using an eco friendly orange household cleaner called Citra Solv, it is possible to transfer a toner ink based photocopy or print onto fabric and it will become permanent! Yes, permanent! 

I was really excited to try this for the first time. I'll give the short version here, but if you want more detail there are some helpful instructions here.

I used a scrap of cotton curtain lining which had a nice smooth feel and a tight weave. Using masking tape, I stuck - print side down- the toner print I wanted to use. (Remember to reverse your image before you print it- especially if you are using some text in your image.) I'm used a collage of old family photos for my first experiment.

 Underneath the fabric I placed a piece of cardboard and underneath that a few layers of fabric just to provide a little "give". 

The paper I used was the cheapest kind of printer paper you can buy -  I think mine came from Asdas.

Be sure not to have any masking tape over the area where your image is.

I used a pin to pierce a couple of holes in the foil on the top of the Citra Solv bottle and then poured a small amount into an old plastic lid. Using a flat natural bristled paint brush I brushed over the back of the paper using only just enough liquid to wet the paper but not oversaturate it. Once you do this you will be able to see right through the paper to your image.

Using the back of a tablespoon, I rubbed hard all over the image. Perhaps I could have rubbed even harder as my image didn't turn out quite as strong as I expected. I think another factor in this was that all my photos were quite small and perhaps a larger image would come out clearer. You will definitely lose some detail however you do it, but I love the aged vintage effect anyway so I didn't mind at all...

...and here is how it turned out.  I was quite pleased with the technique and will surely be using this again for many things ; homemade journals, pillows, sachets....wherever the inspiration takes me! The Citra Solv is not cheap, but a little goes a long way. Use it sparingly. It smells wonderful and is also super for removing stains and general household cleaning. I bought 4 little 8oz bottles all for craft use and am now down to my last one as I used the other 3 for cleaning. I am telling you...once you have smelt the stuff, you'll be hooked! 

I wonder if you'll give this a try...let me know if you do :-)

Have fun being creative !

Doda

 

 

Weekend Workout 19 - LACE

 Hiya Claireliz here with this weekend's workout.

The challenge is to use some lace.

I love using lace on all kinds of projects, mini books, scrapbook pages, altered items & sewing projects. I decided for this challenge to create something from fabric, so I had a go at making a brooch, but it was larger than planned so I changed into into a fascinator. First I took a strip of lace & hand stitched running stitch along one edge & ruffled it around so it started to form a circle...

 

keep on stitching until you end up with a flower shape like this...

 

I did the same again with a strip of navy blue net which I folded in half lengthways...

 

& with a cream strip of net which was also folded in half lengthways...

 

The cream net is the largest piece so I took a circle of felt & stitched it to the back of the cream net flower...

 

Then I added the next 2 layers, one at a time with just a few stitches to catch them into place (with the felt on what would be the underside of the fascinator) so that it looks like this...

 

I then stitched in a few glass pearl beads...

 

On the underside where the felt is I stitched 2 hair grips...

and taadaa...

 

This was my first attempt at making fascinators & I suspect I may be making more, infact thinking about it this will co-ordinate with my outfit for my friends wedding next week. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Dolly here with a little snippet of lace too.

One of the things I love to use lace on is a heritage page or project and I have a heritage page to share which seems to show what I mean.

 
 
The page is of my husband's grandmother and great grandmother and actually his great grandfather too as he is in the photo that the little girl is holding up.

The strip of lace just softened the page a little and added to a heritage feel.

You know me - I like to do things digitally too, and digital lace adds feeling just like real lace.

I wanted a really soft shabby chic feel to this page and the lace helped create that.

 
and finally, an example of using some lovely cotton lace to make something pretty and feminine and just a whole lot of fun.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hello, Eleanor here. Like Dolly, I too have used my lace on a notebook, only mine is somewhat tattier.

It's a music notebook, as any musicians may guess by the title :) for my notes about songs, lyrics, and piano pieces, and details of sheet music I want to buy.      I think I will even use Kel's excellent tutorial for 'tipping in' extra pages, using manuscript paper so that I can jot down a tune, or even compose one, lol.

Anyway, here it is, chipboard covers, modpodge base, half of a vintage lace-trimmed hankie on the right, and strips of cotton lace on the left, chippie letters and metal charms. All sponged lightly over with white gesso, and finally, when dry, sprayed with a mist of watered copper acrylic ink.

a closer look:

xx

 

Weekend Workout 16 - Russian Doll Inspired

Hiya Jayne here. 

One of my favourite possessions is my Russian Doll collection. I have old ones, new ones, dolls on bags, key chains & necklaces. My daughter has to put up with me, and has them on clothes anytime I see one. I am going to Prague soon so hopefully I will get another one for my collection.

Your Weekend Workout ...is to create a piece of craft inspired by Russian Dolls ...it could be something nesting in something, Perhaps just the folk style painting inspires you or the primary colours, or perhaps you too have a Russian Doll obsession :)

Today I have made a Scrapbook page (below) with a photo of some of my Dolls. I haven't got a huge collection but it's slowly growing. I have cut a Doll shape out of paper & the flowers have inspired me for embellishments, though these are very simple.

 

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hello, Eleanor here.

I've made a set of 5 notebooks from small to large (7x7 inches), decorated with paper pieced Russian dolls on mount-board.

I drew the faces with fineliners and gave them rosy cheeks of Promarker, plus a little something in their hair. The inner pages are of assorted patterned scrapbook papers in a toning colour,

bound with the Bind It All .

These were fun to make, and are a little gift for a special someone.

Then again, I might just keep them as, like Jayne, I've had a thing about Russian dolls for years; you may remember my drawing a couple of years ago for the A to Z project:

~~~~~~~~

 Hi Debbie here with a fabric version of Russian Dolls.

One of my friends recently had a very important birthday, suffice to say it was a little over 21. I decided to make a bag and a pin cushion as she has just started sewing!

 

The fabric was printed using a normal printer. I just stuck the fabric to some card using re positionable adhesive spray and ironed the image to fix the image.

I hope she will find the matching pin-cushion useful.

Debbie

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hi Claireliz here.

I had a tiny scrap of russian doll fabric that I wanted to use, but didn't know what I could use it on, then in a flash of inspiration I decided to cover a little notebook (ok, I'm lying about the flash of inspiration, the fabric was on my table, next to a small notebook  when I realised the fabric was the perfect size to cover the notebook lol)

 

I used Gel Medium to glue the fabric to the front of the book & a couple of post it notes to protect the pages as I have a tendency to get carried away when using Gel Medium...

 

I then spent an hour trying to find my book binding tape so I could cover the frayed edge at the top of the notebook, but I couldn't find the tape & its whereabouts is still a mystery so I used some self adhesive ribbon instead...

 

I stitched a little glittery button onto the the elastic closure & now I have a cute little notebook.

C xx

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Weekend Workout 14 - USING EPHEMERA

Welcome to our first weekend workout in July.

This month I set the challenge of using ephemera, if you sign up there are loads of free resources on Flikr.com here. This is the website I have used for this project but there are many free downloads available on the web.

 

I painted the background of a canvas board with yellow acrylic paint and then used a stencil to paint brown dots. I then went over to add orange dots, and painted over the whole canvas with white paint to tone down the colours. I used a sponge to apply the paint as it covers the board very easily and uses less paint, so dries very quickly.

I went around the edges with the sponge to add brown on all the edges.

Then I printed my ephemera sheets and started cutting out shapes for houses. They were glued on with pva, and I printed the words home sweet home. The finishing touch was a wired edged ribbon I used to hang the canvas up, finished off with a bow.

 

 

Hope you will have a look at Flikr and make your own projects with ephemera.

 Debbie x

~~~~~~~~~~~~

 Hello, Eleanor here.

Debbie's challenge fitted in just nicely with my current crafty activity, which is the construction of my very own SMASH books.

EXCEPT... mine are called STICK IT books, for obvious reasons (and because 'smash' just didn't sit right with me, felt too aggressive for this 'over 50' who loves to keep happy, gentle kinds of ephemera) (and now has somewhere to stick it).

I got rather carried away, trying different styles and techniques for the covers. Here is the first one, which was textured chipboard, which I zendoodled, stickered and rub-onned:

 

and here is number 4, (yes, I know!) which is possibly my favourite, because I worked the title to fit under the transparency, and zendoodled again, but in a letterish way:

Here are a few pages ready to be filled; I am using book rings, rather than the bind it all, as I want the option to open them up to insert a programme, or a leaflet, or birthday card:

Paper I like, stamped shipping tags and a pocket.

I have used lots of different writing paper sheets, like this Japanese one, above, and a Japanese paper bag below.

Into these books I am sticking my ephemera -  like this (a photo of my mum taken about 60 years ago, a note from my son, a cross stitch from inside a card):

and these (photos of old friends):

and these (a card from my husband, a drawing from my son, and the NATO alphabet - don't ask):

I have just one rule - for an item to qualify for sticking in, whether it be a map, a little note from a child, a photo, card, ticket, recipe, concert programme, invitation, song lyrics, poem, menu, postcard or even a lock of hair, it has to give me pleasure, bring a smile to my face, or quicken my heart. That's it. No nasty stuff, no horrid things, just happy mementoes.

Like this one:

Have you made your own Smash book? Let us know, we'd love to feature it.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Billy's Diary

By the time you read this, I will be in France on a school trip with the Commenius project visiting other schools in France.

We have a school mascot (Billy the Bulldog) who will be "writing" his own diary to take back and share with the children. I offered to make his diary and couldn't resist knitting him his own beret.

I covered two pieces of 6" by 6" card with paper. If you stick down the opposite sides with glue in the crease and double sided tape on the edges and cut the corners off you get a much neater edge.

Once the inside is covered you can't see the card at all.

I made lots of pages with pockets and tags to pull out in contrasting colours. The pockets have journalling tags that can be filled in when we are there.

I am hoping the children will enjoy reading his diary when he gets back.

 

Debbie x

In the TV ad breaks ...

Hello! Alexa here ...

When my children were little, I had an inner rule for myself about devising activities and games to do or play. As long as it took them longer to do than it took me to prepare and help clear up, that was fine. If it didn't, then it didn't happen. I feel the same about preparing things for Christmas; however, there is also a part of me that likes to add little personal touches, so sometimes that conflicts with my rule! However, here is one which you might like to have a go at, and takes no more time to make than the average TV ad break. It also provides a little bit of added (excuse the pun!) value to a gift. Just sit down with eight items:

• some pretty card or cards
• some plain or lined paper
• a coordinating ink pad
• a trimmer
• a mat
• a hole-puncher
• some ribbon. (Add a corner-rounder if you've got two add breaks to work in.)

I'm not a great fan of Christmassy tags, with holly and Santas and candles, and I'm not a huge lover of the red/green colour combination. This thrifty idea provides me with something a little bit different to tie on a present, uses up accumulated scraps, and is a nice extra little something. Take a piece of pretty card or a greetings/letter card - I love the colours and pattern on these, and there's enough red and green to be traditionally seasonal:



Trim into rectangles: as my cards were 14 cm square, I cut them vertically to get a 7x14 cm strip, then horizontally to get two which were 7x7 cms.



The remaining front strip, which was a single piece of  7x14cms, was folded into a 7x7 cm square also, and the plain back reserved for later.

Ink the edges. (You'll notice that at some point my orange ink-lid got swopped for the crimson one - didn't spot this till I uploaded the photo!)

Now fold each card cover out flat, and hole-punch twice in the fold for the ribbon to go through - eyeball it, don't bother measuring.

Take your plain or lined paper, and make some 'pages' for inside - these need to be rectangular (e.g. 7x14 cms) so that when you fold them in two, you have a square. Four or five are plenty - keep it slim. Slip your folded pages inside each other to make a little booklet, and then trim the right-hand edge a little - if you don't, they will stick out beyond the edge of the card cover. Pop them inside your card cover to make a little book, and open it out from the middle, place it flat on your mat, and hole-punch through the holes already made in the card cover. Don't bother marking them a pencil first - keep it quick and simple!

Next, thread your ribbon through from the outside and tie in a bow.

Cut the plain back of the greetings card which was left over, or use some scraps of white card, to make a smaller square or rectangle - just big enough to write a brief message. Hole-punch it, slip it through the ribbon and tie:

Don't go to lots of trouble making the additional tags - put the energy into the little notebook which will have a use beyond the day of receiving the present. The completed booklet/tag can be tied onto the string or ribbon of a parcel, and the tag can easily be torn off by the recipient when the gift is opened. Instead of a tag (perhaps carefully crafted and beautifully made) which is then usually binned, the person receiving the gift also gets a tiny and pretty notebook for popping into a purse, handbag, pocket or filofax, for shopping lists, to-do lists, reminders, thoughts, inspirational quotes they hear or read, a phone-number they are given ...

Other twists?

• inside, use left-over bits of those scrapbooking papers which are prettily lined, or stamp a journalling block partially onto the little 'pages'.
• use a variety of papers inside in white/cream or other colours.
• use a little white tag on the front - the sort you can buy in stationers in a bags of 50 or so. Or if you have some lying around from a Sissix or Cuttlebug die, use those instead.
• round the corners of the cover and the pages.

These are also great slipped into stockings, or tied to napkin holders if you are having a party and want your guests to have a little something to go away with ... Oh, and make sure you have kept one for youself! Happy crafting!

Project 30 - Christmas Journal

Hiya Claireliz here with a Christmas Journal (in October lol)

I've had to force myself to get festive as I'm in denial about how many presents I need to buy, how many cards I need to make & how many cakes I need to bake.

I usually make a Christmas album of some description but this year I won't have time to take part in any big classes in December so I fancied making a mini book that I could fill in as I go along & as Christmas is a rather important event in our family life I figured it deserved a place in my Project 30 chest, this little 3x3 inch book by Jenni Bowlin was just the thing...

 

I covered the front & back in Bazzill swiss dot & used some Thickers & one lonely American Crafts flair badge to decorate...

 

 

the inside covers were covered in patterned paper & a journaling spot & some Bo Bunny Christmas trees for decoration...

 

and finally the year in Thickers on the back

 

I have no idea what aspects of Christmas I am going to record, its sort of a wait & see project really.

I'm also pleased that Project 30 is coming along nicely & now has a few mini books recording things about this year that are important to me, completed & sat in the chest & the chest itself is nearly finished (I'll do a proper round up at the end when its all complete)

Thanks for stopping by

Hope to see you soon

Claireliz

xx