INDIEana Handicraft Exchange Mini

Today I received an email inviting me to take part in the INDIEana Handicraft Exchange Holiday Hoopla Mini and I took the plunge and joined in. I figured, hey, I took the chance on the Bloomington Handmade Market (which happens in less than 20 days), why not add another notch to the craft show belt? So, yeah. I thought I was done crafting for a bit, having about 40+ books of various shapes and sizes made and over a handful of knitted items ready for the taking, err, selling;) but, now I’m working on finishing about 10-15 more books of a different type just to make sure. Pretty exciting stuff and very unexpected actually, but it couldn’t come at a better time really. These are tough times, and I’d like to help out, so hopefully these shows can do that for me. If not, I can at least chalk it up to experience right? Right. The ‘mini’ will be a little more difficult just because of the timing (9pm is so past my bedtime with the time change) but we’ll make it work. Yes, Tim Gunn, we’ll make it work:)

New Stuff and Progress

So, I’ve been hard hard HARD at work creating these past few weeks and finally, this weekend, I’ve made progress that I can actually show you. Not that I will be showing you right now, because that would involve taking photos of the items I completed and that’s simply not going to happen right now, but, for now I can at least document that I got some things done, and that makes me DARN happy;)

First, while I was at my parents house with Griffin a couple of weeks ago I started working on the covers for six photo albums. That’s about the only thing I completed while there for the week, but it certainly helped, because I already had the pages ready so this weekend all that needed to be done was the sewing and the hole punching- which got done! Yay!

Secondly, I had three (what I call) ‘quarter size’ books to bind and finish the covers of. Yesterday I glued the covers and endsheets and sewed the text block, and today I bound them together. Three more books finished. Woohoo!

Now, I have one ‘large’ book bound that simply needs its cover completed and connected, and I have another that needs to be sewn and the same done to it. Not too bad.

Then, after that, I have one coptic bound book I need to work on that should take too long since the pages are punched, as well as the covers, and the covers are completed. Again, not too bad;)

After all of those (a total of 12 books) I plan on working on some simpler designs with some handmade paper and variations of stab-bindings, using some sticks perhaps (like, chop-stick bindings) and some recycled papers.

I started making an ‘inventory’ list last night of all the books I have complete and ready to sell next month . . .

oh, did I mention I was accepted into the Bloomington Handmade Market at the Waldron on Nov. 21 (our fifth anniversary btw)!!!!


and the list is already over 40 strong (!) which is quite exciting. Even if I sell nothing at the Market (*knock on wood* that this isn’t the case) at least I’ll have a GIANT stock for the Holiday Season:) See, there’s always a silver lining.

Now now, to bind that last ‘large’ book and then photograph a few maybe. Perhaps I’ll update this post with images, you just never know.

Veggie tales

Griffin finally let me get a few things done this week and I feel oh so accomplished for it! These are the cutest little blank coil bound notebooks with vintage images of various veggies on the front. The vintage images are from Just Something I Made (a very very cool crafty blog where she shares TONS of great ideas (and images) with her readers). I absolutely Love these books and plan to make a few more when I get to the craft store to buy some more cover stock and wire coil. I have five in the making- one has pea pods, one with a tomato, radish, onion, and another that I can’t remember at the moment. I printed them onto watercolor paper so when I handtore them they would have that nice frayed edge to make it look a little more ‘vintage’ and used. Love Love Love!

I listed a new book today. It’s a re-purposed novel from the loads of hardcover books my mother-in-law passed my way years ago. At first I didn’t quite know what I would do with all these hardcover books, but then I started, slow but sure, to find a use for them. The first couple I turned into ‘altered books’ – otherwise known as my journals. I have a personal journal that I haven’t worked in for over two months (thanks Griffin) and I have a ‘fertility turned pregnancy’ journal that needs just the last page finished since I managed to work on the next to last page while in labor. (I’m awesome!) So, after turning a few of them into my own personal art projects I decided to use the covers of a few of them for coil bound blank notebooks. I Love Love Love (have always Loved) spiral bound notebooks. It’s something about being able to flip over the top and just see one page at a time, instead of a spread. The joy of the coil. So, I went out and bought a binding machine and lo and behold it uses WIRE- which I also happen to ADORE! So, hear is the end result. My first book. I like it. It’s plain, but still gets the point across.

Time to get a move on

Since having my beautiful baby boy I haven’t had a whole lot of time on my hands, for obvious reasons. So, I’ve had to really prioritize what needs to get done/should get done/I would like to get done, and that hasn’t been so easy when it comes to crafting/making books. I decided a few weeks ago that I would start a new ‘line’ of books that were a little less labor intensive: meaning, perhaps coil bound instead of hand sewn. So, I went out and bought myself a binding machine and set to cutting paper down to size and punching holes. I still haven’t gotten very far, but I’m working on it;) I have hope.

But, I have so many things/ideas in my head that I want to work on, that are less labor intensive than my usual books, but since I have SO many things I get overwhelmed and by the time I put the baby down to nap I can’t figure out what to do first, so I end up spending my time on here instead of doing anything productive whatsoever (case in point). But, today, today I’m making a list here of what I need to get done and hopefully in that order because really, I think organization is the key. At least, I hope it is;)

- punch covers that are already cut
- bind five books that have paper and cover punched
- print onto watercolor paper designs to glue onto covers
- pamphlet bind calendars
- stamp front of calendars with year
- print onto cardstock designs for other calendars

That’s a start;)