Journal Making

I wish that I could show you photos of the delightful people that were a part of this weekend.  It seems everyone has a bit of shyness when it comes to showing themselves publicly.  This blogging crowd likes to stay behind the scenes so to speak.  So, you get to see the things we worked on and made instead.  When I arrived Friday afternoon Jen showed up bearing some amazing gifts for us.

I made those chocolates disappear in short order.  And the paper fish – SCORE!! She also gave us a bottle of cheap summer wine which I’m saving for the perfect summer evening.  The wine in the picture was a total splurge in the $20.00 range that I bought earlier.  Here’s the thing, just because it’s more expensive doesn’t necessarily mean it will be better that the $10.00 stuff.  Lesson learned.  I’m willing to bet that Jen’s cheap summer wine will be better.

Anyway, in between wining and dining and window shopping we made coptic bound journals.  We first chose our paper, and Jen had an entire folio full of awesome papers.

Then we glued the paper to our book boards.  Jen carefully guided us and helped us make neat and tidy corners.  I can still picture the gestures of her hands as she showed us how to fold the paper and use the bone folder to smoothly apply the paper to the boards.

Our book boards were placed under our mattresses overnight so that they could dry without any warping.  If we had had a stack of heavy books we could have used those instead.  The next morning we pulled them out and they were crisp and smooth.  The next step in the process was choosing coordinating thread from Jen’s stash.  We also folded blank pages to create the internal signatures for the journals.  Apparently I had chosen one of the more difficult book binding processes.  The reason I chose it though is because I love the way these journals will lie flat when open.  And the stitching looks like braid work on the bound edge.  In the whole process we learned new vocabulary and used new tools – a hole punching awl, a punching cradle, bookbinding needles, waxed thread.  It makes me giddy thinking about it, and potentially I now have the knowledge I need to make more of these for myself and others.  Thank you, thank you Jen!!

Here is the inside cover of mine and the finished journals that Melinda, Jen and I made!