Twinchie books- so sweet!

My good friend Sonja is hosting her first swap for these cute little two inch booklets... I've never made books this tiny so had to give it a go... especially as I had spent last Tuesday marbling cotton and some papers to stock up.

I wasn't going to make three, I only needed two for the swap, but they turned out so cute I made a spare for me to keep, and I shall be making some more to give to friends.

They were simple to create, make rectangle covers slightly bigger than the 1.5 x 2" pages, decorate and add ribbon. Sew the pages in place adding beads on the outside. Sew in end pages and then glue them to the fabric covers. Press for a while so they dry flat... and enjoy! These don't have anything in them, but I may add some text and images before I send them off. 

If you fancy receiving one of these why not join Sonja's swap and have some fun making your own too!

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Paper fabric and birthday cards...

Paper fabric? I've not tried it before, but as I'm doing alot of mixed media and textile work lately, it seemed only fitting that I give it a go... creating a material stronger than paper alone by collaging layers onto a fabric base.

What fun! I didn't have any muslin for the base, so I used some ponge silk, which would have it's own benefits/ downsides mentioned later.

I gathered up a collection of tissue papers, leaf skeletons, napkins, string, quilling strips etc. Next came ripping, tearing  and  cutting random shapes.

The idea of fabric paper is to have the benefit of pattern/texture and flexibility of paper, but with the added strength of a material base. Using a 40/60 pva/water mix lay out the material on a plastic sheet and wet it down. Adding papers and the other materials in layers, I built it up until I was happy with it, then overlaid with a white tissue paper. I made four with different themes; nature, butterflies, trees and funky. I also sprayed alcohol inks throughout the process... I could have tried glitter, angelina, sequins... or any number of other items!

I laid them out to dry in the sun, but they seemed to firm up even more over the next couple of days.

They turned out quite well for the first batch- I'd like to get a more flexible piece next time, maybe a texture gel will be more forgiving?

When I began to cut out for the birthday cards I found that the silk hadn't stuck very well, so I began to peel it away. Luckily it came away clean, leaving the paper layer intact. However, it did have one suprise, as the glue had seeped into the inks on the papers in some cases it had spread through to the silk, so I had loose, blended image transfers. I shall be trying this again! with specific images. Both the alcohol inks and the sharpies used on some of the papers transfered really well.

One of the projects I wanted this paper fabric for is my Birthday cards swap... I had 7 to make this month. I cut the standard 6 x 4" with various patterned scissors. I planned to work on the elements again as I'd just cut out the set in lino, so I embossed them onto handmade papers and highlighted them with inks. Adding ribbon, brads, and printing "happy birthday" on leaves finishes them off nicely. I also made a name tag on frosted shrinkies for each recipient.

Here they are complete...

I also had a quick play for a bookmark swap and came up with these little treasures...

Sketchbook fun

I'm still working on my textiled sketchbooks, my current creations are A5, I'm finding that's both a nice size to work, and a reasonable size for sketching.
As well as creating these for sale, several of them will be going to unsuspecting friends for christmas, I can't wait to see their faces when they open them!

This is one of my favourites, spirals and blues. 72 pages of artist quality cartridge paper, yummy, I shall have to make one for myself  after the xmas rush. Here are a few of the others...A5's and A6's

Little Rainbow notebooks...

I'm certainly on a roll...

Having made the previous 5 books I had a desperate urge to make some more...this time playing with the contents and papers. Some have mixed coloured papers, some watercolour paper in different weights or coloured writing paper...

With a beaded spine this little notebook is colour coordinated inside and out....

This is a pocketsized watercolour book, now there's no excuse not to paint on the go...

and this 3.5 x 4.5 inch watercolour book is even more cute and lightweight

This is an A5 notebook with matching yellow pages....

 They are all such fun to make, I just love how a white piece of fibre can be transformed into a quilty, soft, intricate story of colours and threads. I try not to predetermine the pattern for a cover- I do too much of that at uni- this is a purely extravagant venture into abstract and intuition. Such joy!

Now I need to set up an Etsy store....

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Little handmade notebooks....

I love making books from scratch, and as I needed a new book to keep a record of my online swaps I decided to make another series. This set has my inked/stitched babywipes as the cover material. There is a photo tutorial in the "How to... books" tab.

Four of these are a cute A6, perfect for your pocket. The rainbow book is my new swapbook, can't wait to christen it!!  

I'm taking orders now for Christmas pressies, made to order for one-off colour/size/page combinations.

You can contact me via the contact page....

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