Sketchbook doodle flowers

All this gorgeous sunny weather made me want to doodle some flowers in my sketch book.

Not a lot of drawing has gone on but I did make a sleeve to house my first four handmade art books.  The sleeve is made using a recycled coffee sachet box and just covered with some paper I had.

I just love little notebooks and I have made myself a promise not to buy them anymore (that probably won't last) but to make my own for jotting down those ideas and making lists in.  These are some I have made ready.

Lastly but not least, I want to thank all my lovely new followers and a lovely sun-filled weekend to everyone.

Handmade accordion tag book

Card and paper has always been a love of mine and now I made a few handmade books, I seem to want to make more. 

The latest is an accordian tag book made with black and white double sided card, which I am so pleased with.  I thought that if I try and sell these I need to make them really special, so I made a gift bag to go with it using handmade paper with flowers pressed in it, (the paper is bought I must add) complete with a gift tag to match the book.

The size of this book is 5.5 x 4.25 inches and can easily expand when photos, tag cards or special items are added.

Handmade folded books

I have a lovely stash of gorgeous double sided card, some are embossed and some are glittery.  As it is such a shame to use only one side I thought I would make these folded books, so that both sides of the card are on show.  I found the instructions for the folding from Alisa Bolden's book Expressive Handmade Books.

Both these books are made from 6x6 inch card and the finished closed book is 2.25x4.25 inches. I made full covers for them so that are completely enclosed when tied. One is greens, golds and orange and the other is pinks, blues and purples.

I so enjoyed doing these that a friend of mine is having a candle party soon and has offered to show some that I am going to make specially, to see if  people are interested in buying.

Am not sure if the pictures show but there are little pockets that tags, messages or photos can be slipped into and the whole book can be embellished further.

Not a paint brush or pen line in sight, so this is a new thing for me. If Jennibellie is reading this then I am afraid that there is no threaded spine involved either, so technically I don't know if these are books. It is her cereal box journal that has set me along this path, so I suggest you check out her fabulous videos, I guarantee you will learn so much.

Happy weekend everyone!