Dyed Paper

I have made a small coptic bound bound using some of the paper that I had dyed previously. I covered the book with some of my eco dyed paper.

 I have also been dyeing more paper using my doilies and shelf liners to create patterns on the paper.

Then with the leftover dye liquid I coloured paper bags and other paper that I had to hand.

I have also been experimenting with dyeing paper using food colouring.  Here are the results, gorgeous vibrant papers.

Mega Trading Cards Swap

Here are the altered cards I made for a Mega Card Swap I was part of in 2016.
These are the "Fours"

This is the "Seven"

These are the "Nines"

These are the "Tens"

Puzzle Book

On the facebook page Crafting Handmade Books with Vintage Page Designs the vApril challenge was to create a book using recycled and unusual items.  I had some childrens puzzles that were missing pieces but because I felt I might have a use for them I had not thrown them away.  So I decided to use the puazzles to make a book.  I glued the remaining puzzle pieces to the puzzle then I cut it in half to make the front and back covers. 

In the spaces where the puzzle pieces were missing I painted the background red and then glued in some word tiles and pen nib. I then filled the cavity with glossy accents.

I made a spine from book board and I covered it with painted Kraftex and covered the edges with washi tape.  When I sewed in the signatures I sewed puzzle pieces on to the spine.

For the inside covers I cut up another puzzle board without the puzzle pieces and painted them.  I then added a couple of puzzle pieces onto the board in their original positions.

 The signatures are made from watercolour and wet cartridge paper.  There are nine signatures comprising seven pages and the signatures have been sewn in using pamphlet stitch.

This was a fun book to make and I plan to make more.

Christmas Journal

Sometime ago I made some large Christmas tags using chipboard from Imagine If NZ. I could not decide what to do with the tags so I decided to make journals using the tags on the covers. Here is the first one.

I used book board to make the covers and covered it with calico which I then painted. I covered the spine with some old lace and glued the tag and a bit more lace to the front cover.

The pages are a combination of different weights and types of paper which have been coffee dyed.  To get the gorgeous green and red papers I dyed them with food colouring.

 I also used some coffee dyed scrapbook paper in the journal.
On some of the scrapbook pages I sewed lace to create pockets.

 The inside covers have been covered with Christmas serviettes that have been glued ovver old dictionary paper,

 I made tabs using the remnants of the serviette papaer, lace and buttons.

 The journal has nine signatures each comprising 7 pages.  I sewed the signatures in using pamphlet stitch and sewed buttons into the spine as I was sewing the signatures.

Recycled Books

After making some of my bigger journals I am always left with offcuts of paper.  So to use the offcuts up I began making small journals.  The covers for these are made from recycled cracker boxes covered with recycled maps.