I hope you are having a very happy Mother's Day...whether you are a Mother, have a Mother, or are a Mother to something furry and cuddly! (smiles!)
I am having the PERFECT Mother's Day! Well, it could be better...I wish I was with my Mom or that Miranda was home (she's working today). But given the circumstances, I am FULLY doing what I love to do best...hang out in my studio, play and have some fun snacks and drink as much soda as I want without anyone bugging me! (more smiles!)
I've spent most of my day organizing and reorganizing my studio. Definitely a hobby of mine. One of other things I did was finish up preparing the pages for a Marie Antoinette Circle Journal I joined in. This project is being hosted by the lovely and talented Kecia. I was feeling SO behind in the tremendous wave of Marie Antoinette-inspired projects that are all over the place ever since the movie was released. So when Kecia suggested this circle journal, I literally JUMPED at the chance to participate!
For this project, Kecia suggested using a three ring binder and prefereably, something vintage such as one of those Better Homes and Garden garden books. I thought I had one but didn't so I used a similar old three-ring binder that I've had for years!!!! It's 8" x 10".
The binder had some old notebook paper in it but decided to make my pages out of some old scrapbook paper that I bought at Goodwill a long time ago. I love this kind of old paper and always buy it up when I see it. Perfect for these types of projects!
I'm excited about using this binder because of this little clip.
I am totally envisioning clipping swatches of Marie-inspired fabrics, laces, ribbons and trims here. Swoon!
So it took me a few attempts to come up with how I wanted to create the pages to send to each participate to decorate.
I knew I wanted to sew them together. Any excuse to sew. I was feeling like the pages needed to be real secure so they wouldn't move around while I was sewing the edges so at first, I tried to glueing them together before sewing. That just made them wrinkly (probably because I used PVA glue). Then I tried stitching an "X" after sewing the edges but I thought if someone were to gesso before decorating, the stitching would show through.
So I just went with the KISS method and just stitched the edges...no glue, no "X's," no bells, no whistles. Couldn't have been happier with how they turned out. They are 6 1/4" x 9 1/2.
The construction of the pages is five sheets of notebook paper sandwiched in between two sheets of scrapbook paper. I cut the paper using a piece of notebook paper as the template and then marked where the holes would be BEFORE I stitched - this was so I wouldn't have to punch through where I stitched. :-)
Close-up of finished stitching...
Pages all punched and ready to be mailed out!
Here's the offical "before" picture of my book...all ready to START!!!
Now comes the fun part...seeking inspiration! There is SO much available on this subject! The movie, this documentary I found at my library as well as this book. Oh and lest I forget the recent Stampington publication, "Marie." Amazing and absolustely fabulous!
I've been organizing and gathering my buttons, ribbons, fabric, etc. in anticipation of starting on this project. I'll leave that visual vacation for another blog post but will tease you with this bit of yummy...
Happy Mother's Day...hope it's a sweet one!
