New Notebooks

When I needed a new notebook for myself, I made a batch of them!


Currently, I'm using this one:

So Many Projects, So Little Time

Hibiscus growing in our backyard jungle

Happy June! How is your art focus? Mine is scattered. I have started a painting on canvas, worked in two art journals, made some new notebooks and an art journal.

 

Art Journal, Coptic stitch

This latest experiment is an art journal using the Coptic stitch. Fellow bookbinders on the Bookbinding Etsy Street Team (BEST) have kindly guided me toward good instructional sources in books and online. I find this binding very confusing and really want to master it since I have so many ideas for using this method. This is 8” x 10” with 140 lb. watercolor paper but next time I’ll use a smaller size and lighter covers than two Ampersand Claybord panels. The surface also takes acrylic paint very differently than the hot-press paper I know and love.

As I needed some more art ideas notebooks for myself, I made these new ones this week.

Three new art ideas notebooks

Thinking of using my photos more, I am considering a new printer. There is a cool one called the Epson Artisan I have my eye on; but it’s so large I would need to find space for it.

How are your summer projects going?

Recent Notebooks

Here are some notebooks I made in a flurry of production last month.

Recycled Notebooks

These two notebooks are an experiment. Can you guess what the materials are?

 

Give up?

Cardboard from tissue boxes, stationery pad paper, buttons, linen thread, and duck tape! They are really cute and fun to make. Now I need to use them and see how sturdy they might or might not be.

Return from Ireland

I spent most of September getting ready and touring around the west coast of Ireland. Here is a special journal I made using blank 140 lb. Fabriano Artistico watercolor paper, as well as already-painted folios. The outside cover is upholstery leather with an inside green fabric fused to it with HeatnBond. Dark green linen thread sewn in a long stitch holds the 6 signatures of 3 folios each in place. There’s a Celtic button and round leather string to close it up. By folding up a recycled painting and hammering in some mini-eyelets, I created pockets. My intention was to take this journal with me everywhere and to write poetry, prose, thoughts, feelings, and lists, as well as to sketch. Spacing the signatures far enough to allow for thick collage, I planned for an all-purpose travel companion.

Now, here’s the ironic part. I did one sketch, in Doolin, the first day, and then nothing. Nada, zilch, nothing! Although it was a small tour group—four paying customers, the tour guide and her boy friend—it was exhausting. So much to see and do and feel. Although the pace was better than a commercial tour, to me if felt like non-stop go, Go, GO! It didn’t help the boyfriend would voice anything that popped into his head and often got into arguments with the girlfriend while the “tourists” became uncomfortable witnesses. Stress was thick when we were all crammed into the one mini-bus. Being an introvert and a Highly Sensitive Person, I found the atmosphere akin to an endurance test.

There were a lot of physical challenges, too: climbing up ancient forts and mountains on slippery rocks and slick grass, hiking here and there, being outside in much cooler (and lovely!) weather, navigating unfamiliar city streets.

Using this small notebook (below), first intended to hold art ideas, I wrote daily activities even on bumpy roads. Thus, my new camera became my main creative outlet for the twelve days. Eventually, with reflection and time, using fliers and brochures, I will transform my unused book into a travel journal.

The Irish food was all good and nourishing; I even acquired a taste for Guinness! The land and weather became a comfort, the people helpful and friendly. And the changeable light—dark clouds, rain, sunshine—illuminated and obscured distances. Ireland touched my soul since I first visited in 1982. So, regardless of the trials of this recent trip, I know the frustrations will fall away, leaving only good photos and good memories.

Happy 2010!

Spiral Mountain & Moon
7.25” x 4.50”
Ink on paper

Taking an idea from a recent Cloth, Paper, Scissors article about zentangles I did this doodle. I was quite pleased with the results. I had wanted to try more doodle-type sketching and it was fun to make.

The doodle is in a small notebook I made with unlined sketch paper and a cover recycled from an acrylic painting on watercolor paper. Sporting blue Irish waxed linen thread and some blue seed beads, it’s a favorite place to jot down creative bursts. Because of their small size, these Art Ideas notebooks get filled quickly; I needed to make three last year.

There is a freedom in working so small. The size is perfect for capturing fleeting ideas and has really contributed to my creativity. My drawings are getting better as I try to express myself in sketches rather than words. I love being able to make my own now rather than using commercial notebooks with their thin, lined, acid-full, ink-bleeding pages.

Lately, I’ve been pondering what direction my art will take in 2010. Have you decided what you are going to concentrate on the next twelve months? Will you try something new or refine a certain technique? Will you branch out or stay with a beloved medium?

Wishing everyone happiness, health, and heaps of creativity in this New Year!

Quest for the Perfect Little Notebook

With a nice, long holiday approaching, I have been gearing up to make a little notebook. I must have a dozen books about book binding and book making crowding my shelves. Since I’ve long loved books, the fact I could make one myself has long appealed to me.


For a few years, I’ve used little notebooks to jot art ideas down. You know the kind—cheapies from grocery or office supply stores. I disliked their lined and bleed-through pages and their flimsy construction. But I love their size! So small, so slim, so easy to slip into a pocket and make notes; no big, bulky, beautiful book. I tried finding 3 ¼” x 4 ½” sketchbooks through online art supply companies and even Etsy. If it came close to the right size, it was too thick.


So, last week, after looking through all my books, checking one out at the library, and reading numerous art blogs and web instructions, I realized I’d have to make exactly what I wanted. After thinking about it most the weekend, I finally took action and conducted an experiment. Do you do that, too—think way too much about a problem? But, have you found you can let yourself off the hook when you declare you’ll just play around or make a model or do an experiment? Your Perfectionist slinks away and the Muses clap their hands in joy, coming to your side to assist.


There are two kinds of notebooks I’ve used: 1) a mass of signatures all folded together and sewed down the middle into a substantial cover, taped on the outside spine and 2) cut single pages, not signatures, glued at the spine with tape and a not-so-thick cover. The later is much more fragile and pages can be easily torn out, like a note pad.


So, I took the best elements of each design, folding signatures together, adding a 65 lb. cardstock cover, punching holes through pages and cover every ½”, sewing the pages and cover together, tying the tails outside with tape, trimming excess paper and cover (I made it larger than final size so everything would line up), and creating a cover from a gelatin print I did on velum. I didn’t add end papers, but could have.


I’m pleased my “experiment” turned out so well—I absolutely love my little notebook! Encouraged with such stunning results, I have enrolled in a four-session bookbinding class beginning in January.


Next up? The Quest for the Perfect Art Journal.