Cafe au Lait Book Kit Finished Photo journal

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.

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Down the Rabbit Hole Book

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.

Going back to 35mm Film

I was exposed to photography from a very early age, with my paternal grandad being an amature photographer and having a darkroom in his house for as long as I could remember.

I started taking my own photos when I was around 15 years old when I left South Africa. I was using my parents camera which was a Canon FT, it even had a telephoto lens. When I started high school here in Australia back in 1996 I was so lucky to be able to do photography as one of my classes, which was sooooo different to what I was used to. South African schools didn't offer some thing like that in their education system.

It wasn't until about 2006 that I decided to go digital and bought my first digital camera. Although the camera was not that cheap the use and process was as no further cost. I made the mistake though of selling my film camera, which has always been a regret of mine.

So recently I was looking at film cameras on eBay and come across a build-it-yourself Twin Lens Reflex and bought one. Then not a week later the photographic society in Adelaide had a Photography Market where I was able to find some cheap expired film which I almost didn't buy.

Three weeks later the camera arrived and I set out to put it all together, which was a little nerve wracking. 

Last week the 36 exposure film FINALLY came to an end and I could get it developed. As I have a negative scanner I didn't get prints done. I had to wait until I could scan the negs in to see what the final result was. 

Here are a few of the photos.

Head over to my flickr and check out the rest of the photos. 

File Folder Mini: Berri, SA Nov 2014

Greeting creative peoples.

AS some of you may know I have not been the best for the last 6 months. Back in June while up in Berri, SA I became mysteriously sick which plagued me for the better part of 5 months. Early November the doctors I was seeing decided after 5 months to finally do some thing and remove my gall bladder. Then came another 2 months recovery.

To help with the healing process a friend and I decided to head back up to Berri for the end stages of my recovery from the surgery. Before leaving I had already started developing a project to do once we return commemorating the closure of the 6 month journey. This is what I came up with.

The entire project proved to be a little tricky to photograph so I did a video instead so you could see how it all worked. The video is at the bottom of the post.

There is further information in the video description when viewed through youtube. 

You are most welcome to leave any comments or questions.

No 36 layout

Last weekend was my birthday and due to being ill for the last 5 and some months and surgery 2 weeks ago, nothing big was planned as we really had no idea how I would be feeling.

In the end I got a free breakfast at Paleo Cafe, walked around Tea Tree Plaza, got some Pixar toys and bought the obligatory cake and went home. This for me was a huge day and I enjoyed every minute of it. Yesterday I did my usual birthday layout to add to my scrapbook collection.

4in strip book with Back to Back binding

So a few months ago I was going through my scrap paper and found I have a large amount of 4 inch strips as I had been doing a fair amount of work in 8 inches. I was about to finish my last photo journal and started working on a way to use up all these strips of paper.  From watching many craft videos on binding methods I opted for what I call a back to back binding method. There is a youtube video at the end of this post where I show the basic construction of one of these books.

I have four of these books now all ready and waiting for photos to go in them. I might even give a few away as presents.

Please feel free to ask any questions or make any comments

Photo Journal #2

Hi Crafters

Back in March I showed you my first coptic stitch bound photo journal which I was very proud of and really enjoyed the entire project from making the book to filling it and completing it. I had to do it all over again only this time I wanted to make it bigger. Little did I know HOW MUCH BIGGER it would be.

Here is a video of me talking about the project and going through the second photo journal.

I hope you have enjoyed this and are inspired to maybe give it a try your self.

Leave a comment or any questions.

Photo Journal #1

At the end of semester last year I decided to start a photo journal for my school holidays, to make sure I didn't sit around doing nothing with my time. I am an instagram user and although I thought it great to take digital photos and post them on line, I liked having a thing to hold and flip through.

As a result of learning how to do Coptic stitch (the youtube tutorial I used it at the end of this post) and binding my own books I decided to go through my vast paper collection and make a photo journal, some thing similar to a smash book but with out the need to by the manufactured products.

I am not lucky enough to own a zink printer (although I wish I could afford one), I created a photoshop A4 template and would add my instagram pics to this then print it out and cut out each photo with my trimmer.

 

The book ended up so large that it needed a closure, which ended up being a nice little buckle I have in my collection.

I really enjoyed doing this process, mostly because I am a visual person and having a visual representation of what I was doing was so much nicer than just journaling my day. As this book became full I make another book and bound it with Coptic Stitch and have started adding things too it.