A bit more playtime.

I am still looking for more ideas to fill the pages of my needlework fabric book, and in the meantime have started a different project.   Above is the cover decoration for a journal-cum-scrapbook based on Nature.   The little plaque at the bottom reads: For the love of Nature.  I found the photo in a copy of the magazine Landscape.  There was overlapping text in the top right corner which I cut out and filled with a tiny photo of a woodpecker.  I am not going to sell the book so copyright will not be a problem.   I placed a small frayed piece of green silk under the left of the photo and added narrow strips of textured paper along the other two sides.   The main background is a slightly larger piece of Khadi paper over a coarse frayed golden fabric.  I added a large leaf button top left and a small tassel made from the pulled threads pulled out from fraying the coarse fabric.  I wrote the words in fine brown pen, cut them out and fixed them behind the little metal plaque with metal brads.  It is rather dull today so I hope my photo will be clear enough.

This made me think of my Mother who would always ask 'What's it for?' when she saw the samples I made during my time at college.  So Mum, this book will be for the love of Nature!

I haven't worked out quite how to tackle the cover but it will be made from tea dyed cotton sheeting over a base of firm cardboard.  The decoration will be glued in place when the cover is made and all the pages have been stitched in.   The pages are just A4 sheets of tea dyed copy paper stitched together in pairs and folded in half to give A5 size.  I would like it to have a rustic look and ideas are all stewing around in my head. 

This is a new departure for me and will be quite a time in the making, but I look forward to finding lots of beautiful and interesting photos to fill it and maybe there will be snippets of poetry added too.

Playtime.

I saw a similar little wrap-around note book on Facebook and wanted to try to make one myself.

Above is the front of the book.

This is the back.  The base is a piece of cardboard packaging, decorated with patterned paper napkins and other bits and pieces.

The inside of both notebooks are the same.  The pages are stitched in place down the lefthand crease to allow for the wrap over.

This is the outside of the second notebook which is waiting for it's pages to be stitched in place.  I have learned such a lot during the making of these two and hope I shall remember it all as I would like to make something larger and more artistic, with a Nature theme.

Work in Progress.

I thought I should return to my first love of stitching to ensure I hadn't forgotten all I learned so many years ago.   I came across the front and back covers of a fabric book, made a while back, and filling it seemed just the thing to get me started.  The cover is made up from scraps and strips of all sorts of fabric - sari ribbon, lace, silk and cotton - with embellishments such as buttons, lace scraps, paper shapes, beads, etc.

I have always like log cabin patchwork so a square had to be included.  I stitched a tiny sewing machine charm in the centre.

I made a lace trimmed pocket on this page, to house a 

C1950s needlecase which once belonged to my mother.

Here I just stitched on various paper and card haberdashery labels

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More, in similar vein.

And again, with the addition of three decorative wooden flower buttons.

I bonded a heart shaped vintage fabric scrap and trimmed it with narrow flowery lace.  In each corner I added a dorset button.

Another pocket and a possibly Edwardian needlecase which once belonged to my grandmother.  It is made from tartan silk and is literally threadbare in places.

This page has a thimble top left, scrap of lace, scissors bottom right, a dorset button and in the centre a tiny wooden cotton reel.   The borders of each double spread are worked in raised chain band over an automatic machine stitch which gives a ladder pattern.

It has been useful to have some hand sewing to do while I sort out my thoughts for more books in the pipeline.  I am often surprised by the way that my books can take over part the way through the making of them.  They seldom turn out exactly how I had imagined them originally.

I am hoping that my next book will be a mix of drawing and stitch, and probably based on the theme of trees.   However, there are still quite a few more pages to make for the needlework one.