Creating a book a month : September Boogie

Yay - I've completed my first journal from Mary Ann Moss's wonderful Full Tilt Boogie class.

Shared my first steps here. This journal has an exposed sewn-on-tapes binding. I loved making the fabric tabs with a mix of the bargain upholstery fabric I found at the arts recycling centre and sari ribbon.

Lots of learning with this book. My first attempt at the binding was made with silk filament yarn which I coloured myself. Pretty, but it was stretching as you can see below.

Very disappointing because I have used this yarn before for binding a journal with no problems. Had to use Bakers twine instead which seemed to work fine, but I am off to try & find a source for proper 4ply waxed linen bookbinding thread for the next one.

The pages inside are a lovely mix of recycled book pages (from library booksales), scrapbook papers, sheet music, and other old papers.

More learning here though - I have lovely old sheet music and book papers that I lifted straight from the original book by snipping the original thread.

This cover is another candidate for a journal :-)

Next time I need to reinforce these centres with tape so they don't tear when I attach them in my own journal...all sorted in the end. Here are some of the inside spreads

Looking forward to journalling in this one...

Back cover

And now I can start my next boogie - I think I can make 5 different journals from the instructions for this class - highly recommended.
See you next month :-)

Cheap Thrills

Also known as simple pleasures....a few bargains picked up recently that will be appearing in my journals

These gorgeous wrapping papers and tapes from Typo. Don't expect to get a present from me wrapped in these! The lovely pastel paper has some great patterns on it...and could easily be cut and glued down to look like tape as well.

And then I got these cute pens from KMart....

Loving the colour names of the permanent sharpies - 80's Glam :: Jellie Pink -- Leg Warmer Orange -- Valley Girl Violet -- Banana Cup Yellow - Argyle Green.
I have new spring sneakers

Love the purple and the spotty insides, but wait - there's more! Inside the sneakers they were packed with this printed newsprint - more journal fodder :-)

I found this very groovy wallpaper in a rubbish bin... There's more than enough to cover a future journal.

More simple pleasures yesterday with a lovely bushwalk.

We are so lucky that we live close to so much natural beauty

Hope you're enjoying simple pleasures or cheap thrills!

Learning to Boogie

I've admired Mary Ann Moss's work for a long time. You might remember the Paris Journal I made for a friend which was inspired by Mary Ann's Remains of the Day journals on her blog.

Paris Journal made by me for a friend - August 2010

She has a special summer sale offer on Full Tilt Boogie and I thought it would be the perfect way to brighten my winter. Her paris travel journal was done in this style.

by Mary Ann Moss

So I signed up, and watched her online videos with interest and smiles - she is such a great teacher and has a lovely style of presentation that is unique.
Then I began the gathering....and then I got sidetracked with the quilt show...and now this is going to be the perfect way to brighten my spring!
I've watched even more of her videos and got all enthusiastic about her free style of journalling and had to buy these

Buy yours here

This past week I've decided on the base for my covers for my first journal

and gathered my papers

and made some signatures

I've even done a test binding

and feeling happy about how the covers are developing

Back cover progress

Front cover progress

So excited to show you the next steps. I'm hoping this will be finished by the end of next week so I can add it to my list of Creating a Book a Month

Lettering, Reading, Liking

You need to keep your eyes open to different sources of inspiration wherever you may be. I've been enjoying Joanne Sharpe's Letter Love course, and recently found a couple of alphabets to add to my collection. The first was in a birthday card....just took the style of the lettering for the words Happy Birthday and this is what I got for my alphabet:

Sam loves this book

and the font of our copy is lovely (I won't link to the amazon copy because their version is different). Spent an evening looking through the different letters and have this alphabet in my Letter Love Journal for reference now

Enjoy seeing what Becky Goldsmith (of Piece O' Cake Designs) has been doing lately with doors - she is having a class in Italy in 2014 entitled Open a Door and has started making door blocks and showing them on her blog. This is her latest entry. And she has a fabulous gathering of photos of mostly italian doors on this pinterest page. The colours and textures are divine.
Did you know that Dina Wakley now has her online classes available on her site - here.
And some recent good reads ::

Sometimes you CAN judge a book by its cover ;-)

Happy weekend everyone

Quilt banners and other quilts

Remember my quilt banner from last month? Promised I would show you what it looked like hanging together with others made by club members for the show (mine is the purple one below)

In the end we had 65 hanging in a lovely wave of colour. You can click on the pictures to get a closer view...

Our club has a public show of quilts every 2 years where club members exhibit what they've made in that time.

Unfortunately the 3 quilts I've made have been given away....thought you might like to see them again :

Wedding Quilt - December 2011

Pukeko - March 2012

Butterfly Quilt - April 2012

There was one I made that was on display without my name -- we made a series of these some years back reminding the public not to touch the quilts :

The statue was an image transfer.
Got a few ideas lining up as contenders for my next quilting project. I'd really like to have this one ready for our next show...

Currently on my design wall

Fabric House challenge

The other challenge for our Celebration quilt show was to make a fabric house. This was my entry

Front view

Back view

I constructed it using Pelmet Vilene for the base to stabalise it, with a layer of batting and fabric on top. I just love NZ fabrics, and had lots of fun creating my 'kiwiana cottage'. Would love to have a holiday bach like this ;-)
Here are some shots of other houses in the fabric village display.

The black boxes were for the public to vote by gold coin for their favourite.

Liz won with her smurf house and also got third(detailed shots of the houses she made here)

The Gingerbread house (back view above) got second.
If you fancy making a house of your own, here's a couple of links ::
Debbi Crane's Little Pink House of Cards  
Chris Gray has been making beautiful stuffed and stitched houses.
Also, the theme for August at The Sketchbook Challenge blog has been shelter - so a few houses appearing there too.
More about the quilt show to come....