Handmade Autograph Book

A friend of mine is taking her 8 year old daughter and niece to Disney World next month. The girls are hoping to collect the Disney character’s autographs while they are there. So she asked me if I could make autograph books for them. She gave me the top 3 favorite colors for each girl and away I went. First I started by finding a cardboard box. Albert just happened to get a new computer last week so we had boxes left from that. I used the box the keyboard came in which was great because it already had one end bent for the flaps of the box which is where the crease to open and close the book would be.



I just randomly chose a size. I wanted it to be small but have plenty of room for them to have a signature and perhaps embellish it later so it can be more like a mini scrapbook. So it is about 7 ½ by 3 ½ inches. I lined-up what will be the front cover and back cover together to make sure they were even (or close enough…remember it’s homemade, not perfection).



Then I roughly punched 2 holes in each piece where I will later put ribbon through to bind the book.Next I covered each piece of cardboard with scrapbook paper and taped it down.



Then I folded in each end like wrapping a present and taped that down.



I used a very tiny screw driver (which happened to be handy) to poke holes through where the previous hole punches were.



Next I cut paper to go inside the book. I made these about 7 ¼ by 3inches.



Two of the pages I taped using double sided tape to the inside of each cover to hide the paper that had been folded over and poked tiny holes in those.



Next I threaded some ribbon through everything and tied a bow.



Finally I decorated the front.

Recipe Boxes

I recently started making boxes....any crafter out there should know about the Cricut die-cutting machine. It's not just for scrapbooking or card making...it's for all crafts! I absolutely love it. The cartridge "From My Kitchen" was my inspiration for starting my boxes. It comes with a “how to” on making a recipe box….but I thought the box that they showed wasn’t too impressive so I decided to take it to the next level. That’s when I designed this box. My first! What I love most about it is that it looks old. First I took the hardware off and stained the box in a walnut stain then allowed it to dry.


I used the apron design and a phrase from the cricut cartridge…added some paper in which I used the inking technique around the edges (inking is just taking an ink pad and dragging it lightly along the edge of the paper making it look slightly discolored and vintage).

Finally I used some mod podge to seal it all in. Then I took a sanding pad and went around the edges, put the hardware back on and it was done…very easy! I was very impressed with the end results that I had to make a second one too…

This was not your typical recipe style box…but I think it turned out just as good. I made both of them in one day, start to finish.

Lomography

In the age of technology where everyone wants things done quickly and with instant results, it’s hard to believe that people are still interested in film cameras. My husband started telling me months ago about this cheap fisheye camera he saw on Amazon that he thought I would like. But I told him that we shouldn’t waste our money especially since my digital pictures can be altered on my computer to make the image a “fisheye” image. And so we kind of left it at that. Then about 2 months ago, Angela was telling me about Lomography cameras and was showing what they did. Little did I know at the time that the fisheye cam was in fact a lomograghy camera as well. So we explored the world of Holga and Diana and I was blown away by the uniqueness, obscured, and vibrant images that appeared with these cameras. The color contrast is amazing and the vignette images are awesome. Sure now with the digital cameras and the software that provided you can create similar images. But where is the element of surprise???? With the Lomography camera and film…you can shoot, shoot, shoot and see what happened later. As you can tell I’m very excited about these cameras. I plan on purchasing my own Diana F+ here in the near future. When I do, I’ll be sure to let you know what I think.



P.S. Jon you’re awesome :)