What I am sharing with you today has me feeling very vulnerable and exposed.
A few months ago I showed something I had made for my self which was a rather awesome book.
I have started filling the book and it has become such an integral element in self care and Self discovery.
I became inspired by the idea of making this book after watching a video on Rocking your Grimoire by Molly Roberts who is a magic practitioner and witch among many other things. While I do not subscribe to the practice of magic and witchcraft as many do, I saw value and benefit to the collection and compilation of information that held meaning to me.
In the wiccan and magic circles this type of book would be termed a grimoire or book of shadows, which for me just did not fit. I have called mine The Codex. Being a book of information relating to me and for me.
So I give you The Codex.
There is a video link at the end of the post with a flip through.
In the book I have sections relating to different things I wanted to have record of.
I have recorded information on my Altar and Zodiac as well as Essential oils, which are a big part of my life. There is also a section on my cat Delta.
I have recorded Plants and Flowers I like and why I like them.
I have found a great bonding with myself by creating this book. Anyone who knows me, will know how much I LOVE tech and the digital age we are living in but I love having a document, a handmade, handwritten BOOK which solely related to my spiritual beliefs, values and principles. It has substance and existence to me which make me feel those things with in my self.
The flip through video. I do mistakenly call the Codex a Chronodex in the beginning which is something entirely different. Doing to many things at the same time.
I have loved working in this book and I still have lots to add and change. And it will be an on going "work in progress".
If this inspires you to create your own Codex all about you so me what you create, I would love to see. I know not everyone has the skills or time and materials to make their own book,
for you, I will be making up and adding blank books like this one to my Etsy store over the coming months. You can also order one by emailing me with some direction of what you would like.
I have been getting back in to the swing of things lately. Today marks one year since I got my wheelchair, today though life is some much better and different. I have been doing intensive physiotherapy every week since the second week of January, as a result I now walk with no walking,, aids and even go put and am being more adventurous. I have also started crafting much much more. First up of my creations I want to share with you is a handmade book I have created for myself.
I have used the Cafe au Lait collection and coffee stained printer paper for the internals.
I have used some Graphic 45 papers for the outer cover and also the inside on the cover.
This ornament on the front cover was made using some Tim Holtz gear and Finnabair embellishments. To compliment this ornament I added some bronze book corners.
To sew in the signatures in a way to not have the stitching on the spine of the book, I used the pamphlet stitch and I sewed each signature to a separate bit of chipboard that I then glued in to the spine.
Hello crafters and creatives and welcome to my blog.
I created a book using my Cafe au Lait book kit printable about year ago and about a week ago I completed putting in photos to make it my most recent photojournal.
I used a long stitch binding from a Marion Smith project which I liked at first, however realised after using the book and adding pictures to it there was a lot of strain put on the binding. I would use coptic stitch in future.
I hope you liked this project and as usual if you have any questions or comments leave them below.
So creative ones, Vampire Hunter Diary project, who's up for seeing what I created here?!
Back on Octorber 2013 Michelle Moony, The Paper Addiction, released this video of her Vampire Hunter Journal Found! I loved it! the great thing was it was a free printable what Michelle linked to in her video.
Hover over the "Resources" tab (don't click) and wait for "Downloads" to show. Down the end of the page you will find some variations of the items in this project.
Vampire Sketchbook Pages
Vampire Journal Pages
Vampire maps
There are no instructions or guides just the content. This leaves things open for you to be so very very creative with this project. Which I just love too!
Here is what I did.
Video flip through of the booklets at the end of the post.
This time I worked on a different style of binding, well not entirely different style. I did long stitch through plaster board mesh. Boy was that fun! Not! I had to redo the binding 4 times because I kept making mistakes. But in the end I was Successful! And it looks pretty awesome to boot.
I kept the cover simple and plain because I tend to take my books/journals out with me. If they have stuff on the cover after a couple trips all of the prettiest would have been ripped off. So I went with a more practical approach. A Simple book plate from Tim Holtz
I used both the original pages from the book kit as well as the alternate ones that were released last week. Have a watch of the youtube video of the flip through to see how I did the pages.
Remember to comment or leave a question and as always Happy crafting!
Hello crafters, so nice to see you today. I have a treat for you.
I made up one of the Down the Rabbit Hole book Kits and I just have to share it with you. As you made be aware I am an avid photographer, taking photos throughout my day as positivity markers. This is all part of managing my depression, which is very important to me.
Over this weekend I printed out the Down the Rabbit Hole book kit on my inkjet Epson printer and set to work on putting it together. I was contemplating doing a coptic stitch binding and all that goes will it but decided to just do a simple string binding.
Here is the making of the book in its various stages.
It was great timing too because my current photo journal is almost full and I was in need of a new book. I have a full shelf of completed books now which is wonderful, because I can grab one and sit and have a cup of Chai tea and flip through it and remember happy times.
I would really love to see what you create with this book kit so feel free to share a link to your project in the comments below.
If you have any questions or comments please leave them below and also remember to sign up for my newsletter either through my blog (top right corner) or facebook page for new releases, discount codes for my webstore, and freebie.
I made this for a new friend who has had a birthday recently.
I also passed on one of my hand bound books as I have SOOO many of them and as this friend does draw I thought she might like it.
I actually made this book cover well over a year ago and did not like how it come out. To resolve this I coated the entire cover in gesso and started again.
I found a crimson spray in my stash and totally love it so using that and some black ink, I ended up with a VERY moody end result and loved it.
Now because I use sprays which are essentially ink you cannot seal the surface with matt medium or anything like that as it just rehydrates the ink and starts moving it around which was what happened the first time I did this cover. SO, what did I use? Hair spray.... and THEN sealed it with matt medium which worked a blast.
I had to relearning coptic stitch to bind the book because I haven't made a bound book in a while. Interestingly enough I seemed to have improved on the method a bit and I have no idea why or how. I am just going with it.
Let me know what you think by asking any questions.
