Shadê's Notebook

Well, I am kinda into these little notebooks lately, hopefully doing one for myself one of these days too. The latest was for the lovely exchange student my in-laws had for the past 6 months; Shadê, who is from Brazil. She was such a delight to have around. Very funny, smart, indepenent, and so fun to be with, always joking. After the journal-y thing I did for Amy, I wanted to do something a little smaller, with a more general purpose, and I was also thinking one with a spine would be nice. As luck would have it, THE SAME DAY I googled "book binding", and while waiting for the page to load, checked out my regualar blog list, I came across this post, and tutorial. Perfect! Though, I wasn't smart enough to understand all the instructions, and didn't have any of the right materials, I made do, and it turned out pretty good! I'd love to get my hands on some binding tape, but I have a feeling, like everything else in Australia, it's not avaliable locally, and if it is, it's a total rip off. I have another one to make for the second exchange student, Steph, from Germany. I will try and do a step by step with my more meagre supplies.




For materials, I used red & silver sparkle vinyl, red poly/cotton and some interfacing for the spine, 1" hinged rings (bigger ones would be nicer, but I can't find them in this two-horse town), industrial spray adhesive, cardboard from a ceral box to help with rigidity for the covers, and eyelets used with my birthday present from last year, a button / eyelet press. I also sewed along the edges of the covers. I'll try to show how-to photos on my next one. I also printed off more paper patterns from the same places as listed in Amy's journal post linked above, and finished it off with a cute little feather and some organza ribbon for presentation.