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!

Days 3, 4 and 5, update! (lace wings, rice krispies and balsa wood)

i've been working at the 30 Days Of Creativity challenge, but most of the stuff i've made had to dry overnight, needed a last finishing touch, etc, so i'm a bit behind in actually posting.


on Friday, day 3, i made super cool free standing lace wings. aren't they awesome? the pattern is from Urban Threads. i made them pink, to match a skirt, which i didn't actually finish in time.... but they matched my tights just as well!

they're stitched onto washaway stabilizer, and after they stitch out, i rinse them in warm water to disolve the stabilizer. i usually lay fsl out on a towel or wash cloth to absorb the moisture.



each wing takes over an hour to stitch out, and for the first one, i only used one layer of stabilizer, and it wasn't enough, and the stitching got a bit stretched. however, i was not willing to start all over again! after the wings dried, i used the same embroidery thread to hand tack the background and the border together.



i got my sister to pin them on my shirt in position, and then i basted them down by hand. fun! i want to make them in every colour of the rainbow!


(blurry, i know, but shouldn't magic be blurry anyways?)


on saturday, day 4, i made vegan, gluten free rice crispie cake. yum! i can't remember where i saw it, but i read about vegan rice crispie cake a few months ago and got it in my head to make it for a party. i have a lot of friends and aquaintances who are vegan or veggie, so i'm used to that, but gluten free was more intimidating for me (thought it ended up being no problem at all). i didn't actually go to that party (i got my days mixed up and missed it!), but saturday night was a housewarming for many of the same people, so it was a good excuse to use the supplies i bought. i used Nature's Path Brown Rice Crispies, Dandie's Vegan Marshmallows (they totally taste the same!!), Earth Balance vegan buttery spread (that shit is so awesome for baking), and a teensy bit of vanilla, homemade with vanilla beans and vodka. all organic, except for the vodka and vanilla!



i made a couple of little flags to label them. simple but effective.



and today, day 5, i finished a birthday card that i've been working on for the past few days. i've posted before about the fabulous sewing lounge and fabric store that my friends Lili and Henry opened last year. this weekend was Spool of Thread's 1st Birthday! yayy!!!

so i made them a card, and took it in today to deliver it, and picked up fabric for a guild project. and i ate a few mini cupcakes, they were awesome!



the card is a piece of balsa wood painted with jacquarde neopaque paint (i love jacquarde paints, their lumiere line in particular is gorgeous). i sketched out the birthday cake on some scrap paper, and then transferred the outlines to wonder under. i ironed each piece onto a fabric scrap, cut out the shapes, peeled off the backing, and ironed them onto the balsa wood. i added some machine stitching for details and defining, and typed Happy Birthday with my typewriter before stitching down the little piece of vintage graph paper.




and that's my days 3, 4 and 5! i haven't decided what to make tomorrow.... do i work on a larger project, or make something small that i can finish and post pictures of? we'll have to see.

Cross Stitch Valentines

i missed last week's Iron Craft challenge, which was "Get Cozy" and was all about cup or mug cozies. i wasn't super inspired, and i didn't have the extra time/energy either. i don't drink coffee, and i really only drink tea when i'm settled in at home or at a friend's, not on the go, so i didn't have a travel mug to make a cozy for. my pottery tea mugs are specifically chosen by how they feel in my hand, so i didn't want to change that by adding a cozy! (what? i'm sure i'm not the only one who cups every mug and then walks around cradling their choice for 10 minutes before deciding for sure! maybe i am.) however, there were some fabulous cozies made, and i'll totally be reviewing them when i finally get around to making cozy for the family members who DO drink coffee (and starbucks hot chocolate) on the go.

so that was the last challenge. but there was NO WAY i was missing out on this week's challenge! the theme was "Be Mine", and y'all know how much i love valentines, as evidenced by the handmade ones i make every year!


at the same time, i also wanted to challenge myself to only use items found at the dollar store. this time of the year, dollar stores are full of valentine stuff, but that sort of felt like cheating... so i gathered up lots of things that weren't specifically seasonal, and could be found year round, but that i could use for valentine projects. i'll be posting more dollar store ideas in the next little bit, so check back soon!

for this project in particular, this is what i grabbed -

a woven paper twine placemat and a red beaded necklace


the same placemat, a beaded headband, and a small pack of no-name brand embroidery floss

and two packs of 6 blank greeting cards, one in red, one in pink.


i searched google for "simple heart cross stitch pattern" and used my favourite of what came up. i took apart the red beaded necklace to use the sparkly floss that it was made of, and used one of the skeins of embroidery floss.




after stitching a few solid hearts, i decided to start trying outlines, and adding beads. fun! i used beads from the red necklace, and from the beaded headband.




after i was done stitching, i cut out my hearts, leaving a bit of space around each one. because i didn't want the colour of the card to show through the holes, i glued each of them to small square of paper that was the same shade as the placemat. (i used one of the envelopes from my packs of cards, since i have other envelopes to use instead)


once that glue was dry, i used scrapbooking pop-up glue dots to adhere the squares to the fronts of the cards. (i didn't buy any, since i had them at home, but you can get them at the dollar store!)

and they're done!

i like finding non-aida cloth materials to cross stitch on, there are so many options out there!



what do you think? would you send them out to your loved ones? do you WANT to send them out to your loved ones? if you do, comment on this post and i'll send the set of them out to you!

simple little garland

now that i've spent way too long making the blog look pretty, it's about time i actually updated!

i've been working on lots of small things, ongoing projects, and things that i've forgotten to photograph, but even so, i'm super behind updating.

among others, i realized that i never got around to posting the garland i made back in february!

this was just a simple project, something that i could do while hanging out with friends and watching a movie (whip it - such a fun movie!)



i used a fiskars squeeze punch to cut the scalloped ovals (i love those punches, they're so handy, and they cut so nicely!) out of an old book, and then a cheapy punch to cut hearts out of the scraps. i ran the hearts through my xyron, and then used staZon ink and a makeup sponge to colour them red.


it would've been a lot easier to just cut the hearts out of red paper, but i like to complicate things sometimes. for that matter, it probably would have been easier to run a piece of paper through the xyron, and then punch out the hearts, rather than trying to slide teensy hearts through it, but again, i complicate things!

i stuck the hearts smack dab in the middle of each oval, and then ran them through my sewing machine, leaving a thread chain between each one. easy peasy!

i hung the garlands along my shelves, and they're still up here! i kinda want to make more garlands using different shapes and stuff, but then i'd have to take these ones down, and i haven't been motivated yet.

recent ATCs

i had the most wonderful day today. i got together with a very dear friend and we played. it had been quite a while since i'd seen her or her partner, and even longer since we'd had an art day, and it was so so good. we played around with gelatin monoprints, and talked art and queer politics and everything in between, and she showed me the various steps she took in making her wedding thank you cards (mine arrived while i was away - i'll definitely be posting it soon, it's so amazing!). we had a little show and tell, and oohed and awed over the amazing pieces i received in last year's chunky pages swap and tip in page swap.

i want to experiment a bit more with the gelatin prints before i post pictures, because today i mostly just started on the base layer of what i'd like to do. i was inspired by an article in the most recent issue of quilting arts magazine, and did a bunch of research online, and our results weren't quite as we expected, though still pretty damn fabulous!

however, in the meantime, i wanted to post the first ATCs i've made in months and months! on wednesday evening i went to the ATC trade group at the richmond art gallery. it was only my second time there and i hadn't made any more cards since i went in may, so i was busy for a few days before, working on some ATCs to take.

i'm feeling very scattered right now, and my supplies are all roaming about the house, so i basically sat myself down and told myself that i was ONLY allowed to use the stuff that was on the table. i pulled out ink pads and some stamps to go along with it, and got to work. i'm quite happy with them.


bluebirds

vintage sheet music, strip of pink tickets, strip of page from a vintage medical book, and blue birds scanned from a vintage card

snip

asian language paper with a blender marker transfer, stazon ink applied through punchinella and part of an invoice ticket.

music/language

stazon ink applied with a netting mask onto vintage sheet music, small pieces of the asian language paper tinted with stazon, pink coupon and vintage silver leaf

admit one

vintage sheet music with an overlay of a left over german/russian dictionary page, punchinella stamped invoice ticket, purple triangles inspired by the fabulous phizzychick, pink coupon

oedipus

the background for this one is from a very old medical book, the paper is extremely fragile until it's glued onto a sturdier surface. the particular page used is talking about the oedipus complex, so i chose postage stamps with a "father" type figure and a "daughter". it's over stamped with two different designs, in green and in blue stazon. vintage silver foil leaf in the centre, and a blue resister glued on using glossy accents.

constitution

the background is a dictionary page, punched out invoice tags, british postage stamp, a scrap of patterened paper, and vintage hole protector thingies (they have a very cool texture in person, they're fabricy!), finished off with blue ink

family strength

transparency image of my great grandmother overlaid on sheet music, b&w film strip along the edge, vintage dictionary snippet, and stazon detailing.

obsolete

vintage photo found on my most recent trip, scanned and printed out. sheet music and asian language page, vintage silver foil leaf, and an office supply stamp "obsolete"

royal command

sheet music stamped with red stazon polka dots, british stamps, cigar band, and vintage pharmacy label

queen 997

stazon inked over netting mask onto a page from a vintage german children's book, triangles cut from canada post labels, punchinella mask stamped invoice tag, and a british stamp

contempt and contemplation

dictionary page stamped with green flower design,asian language page cut with a fiskars scalloped punch and stamped with stazon, then the small praying hands cabachon was glued on with glossy accents. small bits of yellow paper, and part of a vintage card with sewing snaps.

15 cents

vintage sheet music, a vintage ticket, green strip and triangles cut from canada post mailing labels, and a stamp with a neat design.


what do you think? i was quite happy with them.

the group was fairly small, but it was fun. mostly people i hadn't met yet, and a neat mix of styles for trading. i had more cards than there were people at the meeting, so despite trading for 2 cards with a few people, i still have some left for next time. i'll slowly be building up my stock!

inchies!

also received while i was away, my inchies!

the swap was for 10 sets of 5, though i ended up doing 10 sets of 6, because i had enough time, and the brad ones were so simple. you kept one set, and sent out the other 9, ending up with 50 inchies total. this was the second round, now i have 100 inchies that i need to figure out how to display!

foil set

foil tape embossed with a vintage seal stamped and applied to cardstock. the foil has stazOn black detailing, i blotted it on with a makeup sponge and then removed the excess ink with a piece of scrap fabric, leaving it only in the crevices.

felt set

felt squares with embroidery, self explanatory! i did these while visiting with my friend lindsey, we do a "stitch'n'bitch" pretty much every time we get together.

music set

leftover paper from the vines on my sparkly sacred heart project, velvet trim, dymo word

brad sets

mostly just an excuse to use cute new stamps! stamps are embossed and then a brad was added

button set

number tag ephemera with embossed button stamp from paper bag studios and text printed on coloured paper then glued over

my set

these are the ones i kept. i'm missing the "la" inchie, i dropped it somewhere between my studio and the scanner!

i really love the metal tape set and the button sets, they were definitely my favourites! i love how the button sets spelled out "button, button, who's got the button", though i don't think any of my partners actually put it together!