even if my life isn't interesting, at least my journal is!

do you keep a journal? i've tried off and on over the years, but i can never keep up with them. for a long while as a teenager i had sketchbook journals, but i can't keep up with them either. i can't even keep up with a daily symptom log, much less actual personal writing!

my great grandfather kept a daily journal for years and years and it's fun to read them - though truthfully, a lot of it's very dry and routine. there's only so much you can read about the weather and crops 75 years ago before it gets a bit dull! but they're still very interesting to read.



as much as i never write in journals, i do really like to make journals. when i went to manitoba in july, i collected papers of all sorts along the way and made a journal one day when i was up at the cabin. this week's Iron Craft theme was "Done Reading", that is, we were challenged to make something using a book as our main material. this was the perfect excuse to make a few more journals, since my favourite journals are the ones made of recycled book covers.

since i haven't gotten around to posting the book i made while i was away, i'm going to post it along with my two new ones, since it's the same technique anyway.





i start out with an old book that still has a nice sturdy cover. i carefully cut the pages out of the book, leaving me with just the cover.



i measure the book to determine how big my new pages should be, and go through my stash of recycled and thrifted paper, pulling out lined paper, ledger sheets, sheet music, paper bags, envelopes, graph paper, tracing paper, etc. anything goes!

i cut the pages as needed, and fold them into signatures. i punch holes in them, then i stitch them together using the coptic binding technique. if you're unfamiliar with coptic binding, this tutorial is very good, and as is this Youtube video.



i make sure that the front and back signatures have a heavier weight paper on the outside of the signature, so that it can be used to adhere the book into the cover. for the little green book and the book i made in manitoba, i used thick ledger paper for the endpapers, but for the yellow book, i dug out some neat scrapbooking paper.



i use rubber cement to glue the end papers onto the hardcover, let it dry, and ta-da! a new journal, full of interesting papers to write on, draw on, and glue things into!


here's a peak into the pages of each journal -


the Hawthorne book was the book i did while i was away. it's pages are full of thrifted sheet music, ledger paper, graph paper, etc, maps i collected along the way, paper bags, wallpaper that i thrifted, thrifted onion skin paper, brown paper towels and more.


the green and yellow journals have much of the same pages as the hawthorne book, but i had a lot more selection to chose from with my stash, and i didn't use maps, paper bags or paper towels.


graph paper, a glassine envelope, and coloured copy paper


a different graph paper, ledger paper


printed copy paper, onion skin paper, and the ledger used as an end paper


i couldn't resist this cover!



stripey scrapbooking paper end paper in the yellow book


the back endpaper is a bright paisley


graph paper, tracing paper, ledger sheet, sheet music


more sheet music, coloured copy paper


the yellow book is larger, so it has more selection of papers, such as this impractical but pretty pink tissue paper.




of course, now i feel like the journals are too pretty to write in!