From Children's Book to Baby Journal

Posted on October 2, 2010 by city-made_admin

Melany here. I have always loved the way that the Little Golden books looked and felt.  Even the smell of the books brings back many memories from my childhood.

This particular Little Golden book was old and used but didn’t really have anything “wrong” with it.  Honestly, the story was just a little strange and kind of boring and just wasn’t a favorite at our house.

I did love the color scheme and illustrations in the book and chose to turn it into something a little more useful…a baby journal.  Using my box of scrap booking materials (no, I actually do not have time to scrap book if you are wondering) I covered up the text in the book with colored papers.  I also added pieces of lined paper to the book for journaling.   In the book I included the following topics:  Baby’s birth, about baby’s name, baby’s “firsts”, growth and development, baby’s favorite things and baby’s first birthday.  I also left designated space for photos of baby.

This small size of this baby book makes it un-intimidating, especially for a second or third-time mother.

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A Sketchbook Fit for a Queen

Posted on October 1, 2010 by city-made_admin

Today we made a sketchbook honoring the Queen.

No, we are not talking about this queen…

We used a record album cover from this Queen…

We had this great empty record album cover that was screaming, “Repurpose me!”

We decided it would make a great sketchbook.  We took apart the cover and cut recycled paper to fit.



To finish off the sketchbook we drilled holes into the cover and paper and used a Japanese Binding technique (Ask Carol if you would like more details on this…she has many hidden talents).

I hope that the artist who gets to draw in this book is inspired to draw, “Any way the wind blows… doesn’t really matter to me.”

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Re-book

Posted on September 30, 2010 by city-made_admin

Carol here. We have a lot of books in our house. Some of them are in boxes in our basement. Unfortunately, our basement flooded last spring. As a result, some of our books were damaged.

Never fear! We can turn a damaged book into a new, useful book.

First, take apart the old book. Save the cover, but cut away the spine (unless you want to make a flat spine book). I put the damaged text block into the recycling.

Then make your signatures (the paper part of the book). To do that, just choose how any pages you want, fold up the paper and stitch it together. I also added some fun, circle end papers.

Glue it up and dry it flat.

Now you have a nice journal and you didn’t have to throw away a book.

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Sticky Note Journal

Posted on September 29, 2010 by city-made_admin

Carol and I both work for a non-profit organization called the Artery.  We teach ballroom dance to fifth and eighth grade students in the public schools.  There have been numerous articles in the Omaha World Herald highlighting the students in the program.

We cut out pictures and words from the articles and decoupaged them to pieces of post-consumer cardboard.

By gluing a pad of sticky notes to the inside we created this little versatile book.

For more information about the Artery visit www.arteryomaha.org .

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Note card journal

Posted on September 28, 2010 by city-made_admin

We have a great idea for what to do with all those greeting cards, birthday cards, and Christmas cards.

Turn them into a note card journal. Perfect for on the go journaling.

This is an easy project. You need note cards, greeting cards and some key rings.

Punch holes in the top of everything, and join them with the key rings and off you go!

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Old Magazine to Sketchbook

Posted on September 27, 2010 by city-made_admin

Carol here. I am super excited this week because this week we are making handmade books. I have had a passion (maybe obsession) with paper and book making for years. There is nothing I love better than holding a book that I have just made. For Christian and my 12th wedding anniversary, he gave me a nipping press. Now, imagine if you really like jewelry and your hubby buys you an amazing ring or pair of earrings. That is exactly how I felt when I opened the enormous box and saw the beautiful press.

A nipping press is a fast way to apply a lot of pressure in order to flatten and stabilize books and paper in bookbinding. We will be using the press for a lot of our projects this week.

In our first bookbinding project, we used an old magazine as the  cover and the end papers of a small sketch book.

I cut out some pictures of paintings and glued them on to the book board.

I also took out a page from the magazine and used it as the endpapers.

Then I assembled the book and set it in the nipping press. The result is this great sketchbook.

The blank paper inside is also recycled paper. It is old stationary that my husband brought home form work.
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Final Fabric Printing

Posted on September 26, 2010 by city-made_admin

In our final fabric printing post we used some big bubble wrap and the sleeves of an old shirt.

We painted the bubble wrap (not popped), with white fabric paint.

Then we pressed it onto the sleeves and we got this great polka dot pattern.

From the sleeve, we made a wallet.

Well, there you have it. A week of fabric printing with objects found around the house. We would love to see what other fabulous fabric printing ideas are out there. Got any? Send them to us at citymade@gmail.com.

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Fabric Printing, part 6

Posted on September 25, 2010 by city-made_admin

This print is our favorite! It was such a simple process and the result looks so cool. We took rubber bands and an old stamp.

We wrapped the rubber bands around the stamp in a random pattern. Then we put paint all over the rubber band/stamp.

Then we put it on the fabric in a random pattern.

We loved what the result was and thought it would make a great sandwich wrap.

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Fabric Printing, part 5

Posted on September 24, 2010 by city-made_admin

Carol here. Continuing on with our painted fabric week we present toys to fabric to snack bag.

My kids have hundreds of little plastic animals. Since they are getting older, they don’t play with them so much anymore.

We thought it would be fun to paint with them. We painted some lizard feet and an alligator tail and created tracks across the piece of canvas fabric.

Then, we turned it into this fun snack bag.

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Fabric Printing, part 4

Posted on September 23, 2010 by city-made_admin

When we planned this week, we emptied out our “repurpose bin”, (yes, we have a bin full of odds and ends that we want to reuse), and looked through it.

We found this lid from a peanut butter jar, put some paint on the side, and rolled it along some canvas.

What we got was this great railroad track pattern.

A few stitches and it is a fabric storage cube.

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