Travel journal for cousin

My cousin is taking her three girls to Prague & the Czech Republic for a month this summer.  Her husband is Czech, but he will not be there until the second half of the trip.  So my cousin will go over with her sister and her dad for a week, then they leave and she will go out to the countryside to stay with her in-laws for a week before her husband arrives.

This might be challenging for her since she speaks only English, her mother-in-law speaks some English, her father-in-law speaks Czech and German but no English.  I hope the week is not too long for her!

I offered to make a travel journal as a gift for her.  She is far too busy to deal with baby books and other stuff like that (she is pregnant with her fourth child, due in October), and I thought it might be nice for them to have this remembrance of this trip since it's such a long one.  I also thought it might be a nice way to keep the older two girls occupied sometimes when they can add their own drawings and writing to the book (ages 7 and 3-soon-to-be-4-next month).  For that reason as well as that my cousin likes strong, bright colors, I made the journal vibrant and fun.

The cover is made from grungepaper dyed with Fired Brick Distress Stain.  I used kraft cardstock for inner liner, although I didn't do it quite right as by the end I was in a hurry, so I sewed the third of the three signatures outside the liner.  Oops!  Ah well.

The signatures were made from the following card stock colors, obtained from Archiver's:  lemon bliss, scarlet, orange slice, berry, and neutral ivory.

I added a couple of envelopes in as a place to stuff those things that one just doesn't have time to deal with in the moment but doesn't want to throw away.

I also included decorative stubs between nearly every page in each signature to allow for the travel ephemera that is part of what makes books like these so special (receipts, tickets, drawings done by the kids, brochures, pictures, etc.).

In the end I was happy with the journal.  It should be sturdy enough for the job and fun for both my cousin & her daughters to write/draw in.  Now I just have to hope that they actually find time to use it!

Leftover paint

One of the things I have been working on this year is to stop thinking so much and DO more.  So I finally did something in one of the journals I made in Julie's Super Nova Journaling online workshop last year when I had leftover paint from another project.  I took an image that was on one of the collaged, painted-over pages and did it big over the spread.  Quite frankly I was surprised with how well it turned out.  I also tried to pick up some of the patterning on the underlying page and incorporated that in the border.

Travel journal finished

I love my finished Park City travel journal.  The grungeboard cover is pretty amazing, and I'll be making more portable workhorse journals with it.

After hoarding some of the Tim Holtz filmstrip ribbon for probably a couple of years now, I finally used some of it as decoration on the front cover.  Prints were the index prints of my "roll"; I still had to trim them down even from that small size.  But the effort was well worth it.  I adhered the pics to the filmstrip with Glossy Accents, and I used the Tim Holtz Tiny Attacher to staple the completed ribbon onto the front cover.

Even though it's been only three months since the trip, I already like looking back through it at receipts and images.  Must remember that I like finding items/stickers during the trip and using them to fasten things in my journal.

All the workshops I've been doing lately have really freed me up to do things.  Anything.  Everything. I am happy with this year!

Courage--April 2012

The last two or three weeks have seen me busy but not with too terribly much to actually show for it, at least not yet.  I've started on the Texture Town online workshop (Xmas present) by Julie Prichard and Chris Cozen, and I confess to my great surprise that they tricked me into shading!  Never knew I could do that.  That's one of the nice things I find about their workshops is that I often end up doing something I wouldn't have done on my own.  And that, I suppose, is the point.

I've signed up for another online workshop that I am pretty excited about--the first online one that Squam has done, apparently.  Going to a retreat in person is just out of the question for me at this point, as my husband would have to take vacation from work to look after the kids, and my parents aren't close enough to come babysit.  Plus I like to be here when they visit!  But Alena Hennessey's topics sound important to me, and I want to do it.

It will be a great thing for me to wind the spring up with--once the school year ends on 30 May, my time won't be solely my own anymore.  We are traveling a great deal this summer to avoid spending much time here in Central Texas, where it was truly awful last year, so it will be Houston for a week (not any temperature change but at least a chance of scenery & routine for both me and the kids), three weeks in Kansas at my parents' in the country, then three and a half weeks in England and Wales to stay with family and go to the Olympics and a Welsh farmhouse holiday.  When we come back to Texas, there are only two weeks until school starts up again on 27 August.

And of course, once the kids go back to school, it's time for me to start my holiday card business up.  Hopefully this year will be the one where I am a little more organized and efficient.  I'd really like to finish making all cards by the end of October!  (At the latest, by Thanksgiving, which is probably more realistic.)

A couple of weeks ago I had the idea that I could get one or two of my aunties to hold a trunk show for me--have a selection of completed cards and order forms, and they could get some friends over, and we'd have a little cocktail party and order fest.  Then I undercut myself wondering if I'd get any orders, if I got them how crazy would it be to deliver them, could I have any cards ready in time . . . argh. Mostly I think I just ought to make the leap and do it.  I'd also have some gift tags to show and I would love to have my Xmas book that keeps everything in one place done to offer in two versions--a fancy binding version that would be mega-expensive, and a spiral-bound version.

But if I'm going to do that, I really ought to have it designed before the summer begins.  And I ought to have a website that people can visit to find out more "about the artist", 'cause people dig that stuff.  But that also sounds like someone (me!) just putting up barriers that don't have to be so.  Where has the courage of my convictions gone?

[forgotten to publish when written!]

Too drained for anything but a tag

Towards the end of the afternoon I tried to get going on making boards for a book, but I realized that I just didn't have the oomph to do it.  (Of course, I knew that I'm going out of town tomorrow with the kids for a couple of days, plus it was going to be time to fix dinner within two hours . . . I'm sure that knowledge contributed.)

Instead I decided to mess around with a stamp I got from Alpha Stamps for $0.99 yesterday.  The stamp impression was done with Ranger Archival Green ink on a white tag, and then I used Distress Inks in Evergreen Bough, Forest Moss, and Bundled Sage.  The Forest Moss had gone on a bit strong, so I sprinkled water over the tag to mottle the surface and then wiped it off after a few seconds.  After that I grabbed a 7gypsies Conservatory moth stamp and dotted it around with Distress Forest Moss ink.

One of the moths I stamped going the wrong way (should have had it pointing down instead of up), so I needed to obscure it with something.  I had some self-adhesive crystals from a previous project in my drawer, so I put some of those around in a couple of places.

I used Prismacolor pencils smudged with a tortillon on the stamp itself to highlight the woman & her robes, the tree trunks, and the border.

Finally, I added a wire-edged ribbon embellished with a Trinkette, an emerald crystal on a pin, and a large circle bead.  [And about 30 minutes after posting this entry, I decided the really final touch would be a quick spritz of my new Perfect Pearls Biscotti Mist to add some shimmer onto the tag itself.]

It's nothing to write home about really, but it was fun and I like all the greens--must have been inspired by all the springtime things I have been reading about the last few days.

Sunday afternoon

I did this a couple of weeks ago and forgot to post it, apparently.  Can't imagine how that happened!  Ha.

upper right corner (Dremel)

This was just for fun on a Sunday afternoon--nothing serious and playing around with something new.  I believe this was one of the first projects in Flavors for Mixed Media, but I combined techniques from this one and a later one.  It's done on two Claybord panels with NO PAINT.

mountain lines done with knife blade

First I made various marks in the clay surface with my Scratchbord knife and my Dremel tool with a couple of different attachments.  I think then I rubbed soft pastels into different parts of the boards and fixed them by applying gel medium over the top.  After that, I added more shading & depth of color with oil pastels.

deep gouges made with Dremel
(kind of on accident but it worked okay)

It was a pleasant way to spend a couple of hours.  I like the grid layout and plan to use that more often.

Deer Valley travel journal 2012

Grungepaper cover

I got my travel journal done tonight, much to my great satisfaction.  Putting it together was very much a last-minute affair, and I was sewing the binding in the car on the way to the airport, but it got finished before we arrived at the parking lot.

Ribbon binding of 3 signatures

In desperation I had purchased an Amy Tangerine travel journal at Archiver's in the morning of the day we left, but when I got home & opened it I could already see the stitching coming apart.  Not impressed with that.

Close-up of center bead
and braiding

I ripped the stitches out of the binding and used all the inserts that had been there along with sheets from Archiver's that I had (8.5x11" in colors of something like Polar Ice and Natural Cream).  The recent publication of Pages inspired the binding, although I had to modify it a little to suit my project.  I love the ribbon I used, which I'd gotten to make bookmarks as gifts for those who bought my holiday cards last year, and the bead is a Trinkette from Michaels.

Title page (on kraft
paper in case the Distress
Stains didn't set
completely)

For the cover, I used a sheet of Grungepaper that I colored with Distress Stains and then set with my heat gun.  No time for stamping or other decoration!  I ran the top of a trail map my husband had brought me from an earlier trip this year through my Xyron and adhered it to the cover, then I stapled the acetate cover piece from the aforementioned Amy Tangerine journal over that.  (I had to cut it in half; the back part is on my back cover.)

After coming home, I did
take time to draw the
little vases I bought

I guess it really should have been my "Park City travel journal 2012" since I didn't actually ski this year, but oh well.

Opening page, including
small circular Zentangle
(I think I used the wine
bottle base to draw
the circle)

Using the inserts from the store-bought journal worked out quite well.  I had great places to attach things like lift tickets and menus to, and they provided an eclectic element of fun to the overall look.  That will be a great way to use up further scraps from my paper pile.  And not just in travel journals but for my holiday books as well.  Must remember this.



Plenty of blogs occupy my reading list, and while I do honor the effort that others put into creating a remembrance after the actual event is over, I have come to the conclusion that said approach will just not work for me.  Once it's over, I am ready to move on to a new project.  Tonight I was happy to insert all my ephemera into the journal, and I do still plan to print out a few photos and include them as well, but otherwise I am DONE.  No going back and drawing fancy borders, decorating pages, etc.  If I didn't get to it on the trip, it's not going to be in the journal.

One of my daughter's
contributions to the
trip journal

I love the pictures that my daughter included on the pages (there is another one besides the one pictured here).  In years to come it will be so sweet to page through and see her recording of her trip.

I finished my caterpillar book!

Woo hoo, I finished my caterpillar practice book!  I did the first one last week before going on vacation, and then today (while my 12-year-old recuperated at home from having four adult teeth extracted this morning) I did the other two caterpillars.  It surprises me how simple the stitch is and how quickly it can be done.  Once the head is done, instructions aren't even necessary because everything is so clear.

Now . . . I am not pretending that mine was perfectly executed by any stretch of the imagination.  I just think it's pretty damn good for a first go :-).

Front of caterpillar book, done with 7gypsies covers
and waxed linen cord from WalMart for 99 cents

I used one straight needle and one curved needle (would have used two curved ones but I broke one at the beginning of my first caterpillar and was too impatient to bend two more).  The curved one was nice but not absolutely necessary as when doing a Coptic stitch binding.  If you look closely on the middle caterpillar, you'll see that I managed to break one of its legs by mistakenly gathering into the wrap of the body.  As Rick Perry would say, Oops!  (Can't stand that man and am VERY SORRY he is my state's governor.  I certainly didn't vote for him.)

I think the caterpillar looks good, at least as far as I can tell.  If anyone who knows more about book binding than I do has any comments or things to point out, please do so by all means.

Caterpillar sewing across spine (this is the third--
bottom--caterpillar, so theoretically it's the best
one since I did it last)

Back cover of book showing the caterpillars' tails

Open book showing severe splayage due to too-tight
sewing from covers to signatures

One caterpillar stitch completed!

Front of book with first
caterpillar stitching completed

Well, I must say that I am quite delighted!  I do not know what I thought would be so hard about this.  Maybe I am just getting better at following directions--although this was way easier than following those horrible little diagrams for Coptic stitch.

Spine of book showing signatures
attached with caterpillar stitching

The marvelous person who told me a couple of days ago that you just keep on doing what you were doing on the cover when you get to attaching the signatures couldn't have phrased it more perfectly.  And as the images show, that worked a treat.

Back cover of book showing tail end of caterpillar stitching

Possibly the only issue I am going to have is that, as usual, I may have used too much tension.  That is always my problem, it seems.  Ah well.

Inside front cover showing ladder rung pattern
of caterpillar stitch, just like it's supposed to!

I would like to do this in a different color next time.  Having done it with black thread, it does appear that a long bug has crawled on top of my book :-).

Practicing the caterpillar stitch

Now that I'm done with my girlie glam from Traci Bautista's Strathmore workshop, my attention must return to my caterpillar stitch book that I've set myself to do.  I looked again at Keith Smith's book (Volume III) as well as at the wonderful online tutorial posted by some generous Aussies.  Oh--and I also watched this great video of someone demonstrating the caterpillar.

Yet I was still strangely reluctant to begin.  But I am sick of tiptoeing around this, I want to get the book done and its parts off my dining room table, and I need to get it done pronto so I can make a quick trip journal for our long-weekend-vacation that we leave on in one week exactly.  So, no more delaying.

But . . . I still wasn't ready to poke holes and blaze forth.  I have decided to be an adult about this and actually do a prototype.  In general I never do those--waste of time and materials--but if I screw up my nice book covers, I will be disappointed, so I thought some practice might actually be in order here.  I grabbed a piece of scrap kraft card stock and some linen thread I picked up from WalMart for 99 cents, intending it for just such an occasion as this (i.e., one not to waste the good supplies on).  I used a candle flame to bend myself a second curved needle, and I used a black Copic marker to color half of the thread black in order to replicate using two different colors of thread.  (In reality, I just cut one long piece of thread and put needles on each end.)

Much to my great surprise, this was pretty simple.  I think watching the video and understanding that the back of the caterpillar looks like ladder rungs helped a lot.  And now I get it that one just continues onto the signatures from the front board (thanks, Risi).  Doing the practice was good because I realized that I need to poke my holes a little wider to allow the legs to be longer.  I am still not sure how one turns around to attach the back board, but I will go back to Keith's book and figure that out--although I guess I do have to do that before I start because I need to punch the holes for it.  Hmm.

I am encouraged by this!