Upcycled Book Journal

My husband and I are going on a two week trip to Europe in just a couple of weeks and I desperately wanted to make myself a travel journal to bring along with us. I have read a bunch of tutorials on putting one of these together, so I don't really know who to give credit to for this whole project. There were so many good options to follow!

While I was putting mine together, I didn't really follow a tutorial step-by-step. I just melded all of the ideas together in my mind and went with it. I also didn't want to make a cover out of fabric or cardboard, so I used a smaller hardcover book that I bought from Goodwill. So far I've made one out of a "Tuesdays with Morrie" book and in this post I made one from a James Herriot publishing of "Animal Stories." I chose books that had neutral cover colors and were very solidly made. So, here's how I did it:

1) Remove all of the ***printed*** pages from the book. I left in the colored first and last page that is attached to the actual cover of the book because I will attach that page to my pages later on. I also left in the binding left over from the book's pages. Not only doe sit make the book look more official since my binding isn't quite as professional) but it also gives the spine of the book a little more support than if you were to rip all of the glue out. My pages cover it up anyway, so it really doesn't matter that it's there.

2) Make yourself a bunch of "signatures" - or groupings of pages folded together. Mine are cut down to fit the book from 8.5x11 inch pages of copy paper. I grouped together 3 pages (so when you fold them in half the signature has 6 pages in it). You can always do more, but the smaller the signatures the smoother the pages look on the edge of the journal. So use more sheets if you want a rougher look. I used 10 signatures for this particular journal, so 60 pages.

3) Make the folded edges of the signatures all even up, press down the stack and mark it with a pencil where you'll be sewing them all together. I marked mine a little ways in from the edges (just eye-balled it), and in the middle. You will need an even number of marks so you start and finish on the outside of the pages.

4) Open up all of the signatures and poke a hole where you made each mark. I used a thumb tack and it worked marvelously. You can use a fancy crafting tool, but I just had the tacks lying around not doing anything useful.

5) Once they are all pierced, you'll start sewing them together. Tie a large knot in a very long piece of string (I did double my "wingspan" for length). Start in one corner of the stack of signatures, doesn't really matter where, and thread in the string through the first hole, out the second, in the third, out the fourth, in the fifth and out the sixth (and so on if you have more holes that I did). Once you get to the place where you'll add the next signature, put one on top (or on bottom depending on which corner you started on) and thread through the first hole and out the second. Here is where I doubled back to the first signature I worked on and threaded into the second hole and out of its first hole, then back to the second signature through the first hole, and out the second hole to continue on my way down that signature. When I got to the end of each signature, I secured it this way to the signature I had sewn just before in order to keep the pages taught together. If this is confusing and you want me to make a diagram or something, just ask. Keep sewing together until you get through the last signature, then tie off the string in a knot.

6) To give the pages a little more stability, I glued along the sewing as well. I clipped the pages together and then found a very large, heavy book (text books work marvelously) to weigh the pages down. Then I used regular Elmer's glue (white or clear - doesn't matter I've actually used both) with a small paint brush and brushed the glue along the "spine" of the sewn together signatures. I was also a little impatient, so I used a hair dryer to make the glue dry faster so I could finish the book.

7) Take your glue, and spreading on a thin layer over the colored pages you left inside the book, press the first and last page of the signatures onto the glue. I lined up the edges so I glued the entire page down. Since I also left in some of the glue and binding from the original pages of the book, the thread that is left at the top and bottom of the spine gave me a great guide for where my pages should be so I didn't really have to measure or line anything up. So easy!

8) Just let it dry for a few minutes, and now you're ready to use your journal!

I love mine. I'm using one for a crafty journal and the one I just made for our upcoming travels. I hope you all try doing this, if you like journals. It is so easy and sturdy and I just love it! Happy crafting!

Mario Cross Stitch

After much fussing about the frame, my Mario cross stitch is finished! I think it turned out quite well. I was thinking of putting a black matte around it over the fabric, but the fabric is a little stretched so it didn't quite work. Instead I just folded under the white canvas, taped it to the black paper that is now behind it and put the whole ensemble in an 8x10 frame.

You can still tell that it's not quite square, but it looks much better than having a square matte around it. That only drew attention to its little lopsidedness since you could see some of the white canvas in some spaces.

I had originally purchased a floating frame for the project, but I'm glad I went with just a basic 8x10 instead. The space around the cross stitch isn't all the same, but it's even on the sides and on the bottom. So, I'm happy with it. If you'd like the pattern, please just ask. I think I posted a picture of it in my sneak peek, but it's much easier to see from the original excel document. Anyway, happy crafting! :)

Pattern

Sneak Peek!

Apparently all of my crafting time is getting eaten up by Mario themed things! I'm making a cross stitch patern for some friends of ours that just had their first baby. They've decorated their room in a Super Mario theme, so I put my quilt pattern and character patterns to good use. This is the design I came up with:

I have a bunch of other characters I could use on something like this. My husband now wants one of these for himself as well as the quilt I'm still working on. I told him I'd be finishing up this one first, then finishing up his quilt and then start working on his Mario cross stitch. I think he'll survive, and this way he'll have plenty of time to design which characters he wants where and what he wants the back ground colors to be.

This is how the project looks part-way through...

Once I have it all put together I'll put up a new picture of the whole project. All finished it will be a square project, probably about 5"x5" or 6"x6". I think finding a picture frame to fit the project will be the hardest part. Happy crafting!! :)

Super Mario Quilt #5

I know, I know, I've been slacking on posts for this quilt. Well, that's because I hadn't made much progress on it until the last few days. I now have 9 character squares put together out of 24, so just barely over 1/3 of the way done with those. I'd say that is a very big accomplishment since each square takes between 5-6 hours to complete, so that's between 45-54 hours spent on making this quilt already!

I thought I would give a little step-by-step on how I put everything together for a character square and then show you all of the ones that I have complete. So, here goes!


1) Lay out the squares into the character pattern and then gather them into a stack for each row to sew.


2) Sew each row together, one square at a time.

3) Iron out the rows. I press the seams in an alternating pattern, so the first strip I'll press the seams down to the right and for the second I'll press the seams down the to left, then the next down to the right, then down to the left, so on and so forth until all the seams are pressed. I also trim off all of the thread tails at this point so they aren't poking through

                                                          all over the place.

4) Sew the rows together. I pin each seam together so that all the corners line up nicely. This is when that alternating ironing pattern pays off because the seams go together so much easier!

5) Iron out the entire square and you're done!

Now, as promised, here's the picture of all of the squares I have completed so far (fyi, the bed in the picture is a queen-size bed):

Happy Crafting! :)

Super Bowl Chili

We didn't really care who won or lost the Super Bowl this year, but we still got together with a couple friends to watch the game. I'm sure we paid much closer attention to the commercials (some good, some definitely bad) and really didn't see too many plays of the game.

Something I make a lot when friends come over is a big pot of chili. It's too hard to make chili for two people, so gatherings is really the only time we get to have it. Here's my recipe for a "super" bowl of chili.

Ingredients:
2 1/2 - 3 lbs of ground beef, browned
2 cans red kidney beans, drained
2 cans chili-ready tomatoes
2 small jars chili sauce
2 medium cans tomato sauce
1 medium white onion, finely chopped
1/2 to 3/4 cup water

Seasoning for mild chili:
2 tablespoons smoked tobasco sauce
1/2 tablespoon chili powder
1/2 tablespoon Lawry's seasoning salt
1/2 tablespoon garlic pepper

Seasoning for hot chili:
1/2 to 3/4 bottle of smoked tobasco sauce
1 tablespoon of chili powder
1/2 tablespoon Lawry's seasoning salt
1/2 tablespoon garlic pepper
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper

Toppings:
Shredded cheese of your choice
Sour cream
Green onions, sliced
Oyster crackers

Directions:
1)Combine all ingredients in a large crock pot.
2) Choose seasoning level and add spices to crock pot mixture.
3) Cook on high for 3 hours or on low for 5-6, stirring occasionally.
4)When ready, serve in bowls and add toppings as desired.

I hope you all give this recipe a try. It is a crowd pleaser! You can definitely make this the night before, store it in the fridge and plug it in in the morning - just increase the time in the crock pot since it will have to heat up more. You can also freeze any left overs that you have - if you have any. :) Happy cooking!

Valentine's Yarn Wreath

Today I thought I would try my hand at a yarn wreath. I've always liked how these look and my sister is having a housewarming party, so I'm going to give her the first one as a housewarming present. I think it turned out quite well, but my husband doesn't think it has enough "stuff" on it. He thinks the whole wreath needs to be covered in flowers for it to look like a wreath. I showed him other examples of it online and his response was, "oh" - so I guess that means he's OK with it. Oh well, because I plan to make one for our door too!

So, I started off with a Styrofoam wreath form and wrapped it tightly in red, gray and white yarn. This took about 90 minutes to do since I started and stopped with different colors of yarn. I also didn't wrap the wreath form with anything underneath the yarn, so I had to make sure I was wrapping tightly enough so that none of the Styrofoam would show through.

Then I cut out circles in red, light pink, white and black felt to make the felt roses. I made a few larger ones and mostly small ones for an accent.  I found that if you roll them like I show in the picture - on the top of the felt toward the center instead of underneath - they open up more like roses and the petals look a little more natural. Then you can glue the very center of the spiral to the bottom to make it all stick together well. Once I had them all rolled and put together I glued on the feathers for the background behind the roses. Then I arranged the roses and glued them on.

The last piece was adding a bit of ribbon to hang it on the door. I think for the one I make for our door I'll have the ribbon be a bit longer. I don't know that I like seeing our apartment number through the middle of the wreath. I'll have to play around with it.

I think for the wreath that I keep, I might wrap the entire wreath form in red yarn and then crisscross the white and gray yarn over the red. Maybe it will look a little bit like argyle then. :) I'll probably do the same thing for the roses and feathers since I like it. Anyway, I've seen many of these wreaths around and there's probably a million tutorials for it so I have no idea who to credit for this design. I've seen it too much, so I don't remember where I saw it first. I hope you try it out, because it was a lot of fun to make! Happy crafting!

Skittles Vodka

I just realized I have been neglecting my blog as of late... I haven't posted anything for January! Well, this time my husband and I actually made something together! He read about making Skittles vodka on his own and came to me with a pleading look in his eye that said, "Can you please make something that I'm into?" (How could I say no to that!?)

I was fairly skeptical that this project would turn out or even taste good, but my misgivings were not necessary. It was a bit of a sticky mess, but in the end each colorful bottle tastes just like a melted skittle (with a little vodka aftertaste)! And no, I haven't been slacking on my blog because I've been drinking too much - although this product IS that good. :)


Ingredients:
-1.75mL bottle of vodka (I used Three Olives)
-2 large bags of Skittles
-5 large empty Gatorade bottles (or container of similar size)
-Lots of coffee filters
-Disposable cups (or you can use washable ones too)
-5 glass bottles for storage of the final product


Step 1: separate out the Skittles by color and place each color inside a Gatorade bottle.
Step 2: Divide vodka evenly between the 5 Gatorade bottles - pour over the skittles.
Step 3: Shake, shake, shake - and let sit overnight. You can shake several times throughout the day/night if you want.
Step 4: Once all skittles have dissolved (or fairly close) you'll want to strain the liquid into the disposable cups. Place a coffee filter inside the cup so that it is about an inch of the bottom and pour in the liquid.
**We had some difficulty with this step, so we used our fingers to gently squeeze the coffee filters so the liquid wouldn't get stuck inside. Your fingers will turn a nice shade of orange-green if you don't put gloves on, but that goes away in a day or so.
Step 5: Pour filtered liquid into your glass bottles for storage.
Step 6: Enjoy! We like to mix the cherry and orange flavors together with a white soda, and found the lime flavor to be the most potent.

In case you're wondering, we found our glass bottles at World Market. They are small olive oil bottles, but I really liked the shape. There are a lot of blogs out there that talk about doing this, so by all means, if you find another one that works, or helps with the filtration process more, please share! Otherwise, happy cooking!