I picked up several of these little hard-backed kraft-covered journals last week, thinking that they'd make good stocking fillers, once suitably decorated.
I stamped the word "journal" onto the front cover, then made this sleeve to go around the book. The stamp is called "Mort had a pin curl", by Stampotique. Isn't that a great name? He was coloured in using promarkers an then masked off and the background was coloured with distress inks. Since he's sporting a great set of fangs, I'm going to enter him into my friend Hels' Sunday Stamper Challenge this week, which is "Monster Mash".
I'm getting quite hooked on these 2x2 books! They're a great size cos they're big enough to stamp on, but small enough that you can finish them quickly. This one is for a friends birthday, a few pages are duplicates of things in other projects, but I have mostly missed those out on the photos I've included on here. I hope you like it!
I've called this a mini-book, but perhaps it should really be called a micro-book, as it's only 2 inches square! It was intended as a kind of sampler, no set theme, just an attempt to incorporate a range of images and techniques on a small scale into one coherent whole.
As there are 18 sides plus covers in this, I'm not going to write about each one. Suffice it to say that the book incorporates stamping, masking, embossing, batik, dabbers and alcohol inks. That might sound a lot, but as the pages are so small, it didn't take to long to make. I hope you like it!
As I said in my post yesterday, I felt the need to have a break from making Christmassy things for lists and swaps, and to make something just for myself.
The words in this tag book are taken from the song "They Shoot Horses, Don't They?" by Racing Cars. The song was inspired by the Jane Fonda movie of the same name (for all you trivia buffs out there! :o), and I've wanted to use it in a project for a while now. I took the opportunity to try out some of the stamps I've acquired recently and, of course, to use the Bind-it-all again.
While we're talking about tag books (we were, pay attention, there's a quiz later) I want your opinion on something. Although the pages in this book are made from stationery tags, and I've put eyelets in each one, I opted NOT to put ribbon through them. Anyone that knows me knows that I have so much ribbon it is almost coming out of my ears - I don't seem to be able to stop buying it. Much as I love ribbon, (to an extent that is, quite frankly, embarrassing for a middle-aged man), I've had a bit of a change of heart in the last few days.
Looking back at my projects and those of others online, I've been feeling lately that when I see tag books with ribbons sticking out the side from each page (as all MINE do) the book can sometimes look like it's suffering death by a thousand ribbons. Ribbon is lovely, but so much in one project perhaps seems a bit desperate and could almost be yelling "I'm pretty - love me, darn it, LOVE ME!!" Anyway, that's how I've been feeling lately. Rant over. I'd be interested in hearing your opinions! :o)
Click on the cover image below to see the "flipbook" version that allows you to turn the pages and to see the two-page spreads together, as they were intended to be viewed. If you're unable to view it, I have included a slide show below, so hopefully that will work for you!
Enjoy! :o)
P.S. If it doesn't work for you, your browser may not have the latest version of the bit it needs to see the book. You can get it by following this link:
By special request, I have created a flipbook of Alice Revisited, a project I did last year. I made 4 or 5 copies of this, all of which have now passed into other hands, so special thanks to my friend Andrea for scanning this for me!
Click on the picture below to open it, then use your mouse to turn the pages by clicking and dragging!
P.S. If it doesn't work for you, your browser may not have the latest version of the bit it needs to see the book. You can get it by following this link:
Challenged by a friend to make something using scrapbook papers (something I don't do often), this is what I came up with. The song I Know What You're Doing by Dionne Farris is a favourite on my ipod right now, and as I was listening to it when I started this, I used some of the lyrics as the text.
It's a Maya Road chipboard book, and was covered with Sage and Sky Butcher's Block papers. I've had those for a long time and always liked them, so it's nice to have finally used them on something. I also used some of the new Tim Holtz unmounted stamps, which I'm loving! While on holiday in the USA in the summer I bought some snaps that look like phillips screw heads, and I've used those for the first time here. Am loving those too!
This turned out a lot grungier than I had originally planned, I guess it was just the mood I was in! Oh, and just to say, if I'd actually counted and realised there were 20 sides of chipboard to be worked on, I may never have started it!! LOL
As ever, click on an image if you want to see a larger version. Enjoy :o)
I got to thinking about nursery rhymes the other day, you know, the way you do (or maybe you don't, but I do). They're all so old now, often written as cautionary tales about events of the time, for example, I believe that ring-a-ring-a-roses is about the great plague.
I thought it was time some of them were updated to caution against more modern phenomena such as divorce, drug addiction, etc. Cheery soul, aint I?
Covers
Page 1
Pages 2/3 "Peter, Peter, married cheater, always looks for something sweeter"
Pages 4/5 "Little Miss Muffet sat on a bus, her marriage had crumbled with minimum fuss"
Pages 6/7 "Georgy Porgy, pudding and pie, addicted to pills that made him high"
Pages 8/9 "Monday's child is tense of face, with nervous glance and can of mace"
Pages 10/11 "Jack Sprat got none of that, his wife was never keen"
Pages 12/13 "Lucy Locket, electric socket, farewell note stuffed in her pocket"
Pages 14/15 "Matilda told such dreadful lies, a friendless life became her prize".
