Tag: handmade books

C’est Fini!!

Dear Liza,

Your book is finished!! Two solid days of being snowbound in Portland got me focused and brave enough to get it done.

After using a heavy grommet punch to put holes in the fabric covered spine, I clamped the pages, illustrations, and covers together. Ruthie Inman had sent me a whole book-sewing kit as part of her continuing role as “Judy Nudger”, getting me over being afraid of new things.

It must have worked, because here I am!

Using the awl from the kit, I pushed and twirled through all 70 pages, then started sewing! This is a technique called Stab Binding, and it was wonderful! I watched several YouTube lessons, then made up my own pattern.

I had been looking forward to this part, and it didn’t disappoint.

How satisfying to put the whole project together with my own hands!


See you soon!

Love,

Grandma Judy

Not Quite Done Yet!

Dear Liza,

Every time I think I’m nearly done with your story, I trip over the next step.

It took about five months to get the story itself written. Research on Denmark and its geography took a while, then making up how to get around and what should happen next, as well as how to create coded clues, kept me very busy and were lots of fun!

Once the adventure was written, I realized that it needed some illustrations. So there were a couple of months of noodling around with colored pencils, paints and collage. I looked at my favorite illustrators for inspiration. I studied Eric Carle, Margaret Wise Brown, and Dr. Seuss. I ended up with a combination of Henri Matisse and a clever third grader.

Since this is going to be a hand-made, hardcover book, I needed to come up with a design for the cover. It had to be like the inside illustrations but different enough to not give the story away.

Printing the pages took longer than I expected, as well.

Wrestling with Microsoft Word running on an Apple Mac was a test in checking every box and knowing when to walk away rather than smacking the equipment. I lost count of how many pages got printed too small, sideways, or just totally wrong. Let’s just say I have plenty of scratch paper for my next project. But it eventually worked out.

What’s next? Printing the illustrations, punching holes, and lacing the whole darn thing together!!

Love,

Grandma Judy