From Trash to Treasure

From Trash to Treasure...I found a broken journal at one of my local Michael's and couldn't resist buying it.  I had to see what I could do.  Looking at it the only thing wrong was that the elastic closure was pulled out from where it should have been tucked into the book. That's a slightly easy fix if things go the way they should. 

I brought the journal home, repaired the elastic (thankfully everything did go the way it should,) and got to work on painting. I painted and painted and painstakingly painted with the tiniest brush I had. 

All in all it took me about four to five days of painting on and off.  The intricacy and the tiny details made my eyes go buggy.  I had to do it in sections and at intervals to give my eyes a break. 
Looking at the brown and the gold I immediately thought that this book was screaming to be a steampunk book. I set off to find a digital steampunk stamp that would be a perfect fit for this book.

I came across that stamp on StitchyBearStamps by a creator known as BB Kakes.

Steampunk - 3 pc set

I purchased it, read the TOU to make sure it I was within the right to use it for this project, and printed it out a few time on some Copic marker friendly paper.

Why a few times you might, well it's so I can use one test colors and play with, one to lay out my colors, figure out shading and how I'm going to finish it, and the last one to do my final colors on.

Here's my second one with my colors listed so I know which markers to use where on the final.

And here is the final all colored and fussy cut out.

 On the final image I used Tim Holtz's Distress Stains and Paints for the gears and metal. I used some Ranger Glossy Accents on the glasses and the face of the pocket watch after shading in the gray color to give them the glass look.

Then it was off to the book....

I used some Prima Marketing Engraver Collection "Cesello" (845315) paper as the back ground.  Glued my stamp just off center.  I placed the "Jouranl" sticker from Prima's Engraver collection (563479) so that the end of the sticker lined up with the edge of her shoulder.
I used some Prima flowers for embellishment (Black rose -552619, Small maroon roses - 553302.)  On one of the small roses I pulled out the center of the rose and added a button (550776.) The key paper clip (564681) I cut the clip part off of to make it look like just a key.  I then added miscellaneous mechanicals, gears from Tim Holtz and Bead Landing along with some clock hands and key hole from Bead Landing.

Here's the journal all finished:

 


 

Make it Crafty Coloring Challenge #10

Cutting it close with this one. Last day of the month posting....It's been a crazy month with the kiddos last few days of school just last week. I managed to squeeze in some time to do some coloring for the new Make-it-Crafty's  coloring challenge.  In case, you missed my posts for a few months you these coloring challenges are a fun way to challenge or work on your coloring skills.

So there are two different challenges, a hard and an easy one.  This month the hard is coloring curly hair and the easy is coloring with pink and brown.  Because I was on such a time crunch this month I opted for the easy one.

Lets see....I started with two different digital stamps from Make-it-Crafty.

Here's the first: 

 

Daffodil Swing Digi Stamp

And the second was:

Sitting Annalise Digi Stamp

I chose these two images because it was also "something girly" (the challenge's title, and the Facebook group challenge.)  As a little girl I loved to swing, and so do my daughters, so I thought this would be perfect to do as something girly.




To make the final image I took the two into Photoshop; flipped Annalise, rotated her a little to line her up with the swing and removed some of the daffodils to come up with my final image.  I held off coloring until my new favorite color pencils arrived, Faber-Castell Polychromos pencils. This was the first image I colored with them and I'm in love.  They blend beautifully and lay down easily, by far the best pencils I've used.  To top it off all of Faber-Castell's lines match so you can use markers, pencils and watercolors with ease. So excited to do more with their products.

Any who....I used my finial colored image to alter a medium sized Moleskin lined journal.  Added some new Prima Marketing Inc. flowers to it.  Throw in some papers, Tim Holtz Distress Stickles, glitter, metal frame, Silks paints, leaves and a fun inspiring saying and you get the finished journal.  By the way the cute little saying is "In a sky full of stars it's amazing to find that each is one-of-a-kind."

I hope you like it...

 

My Comic Book Book - Lady Mechanika

My Comic Book Book.....This book took me a bit of luck to make.   When I found out that my husband was going to set up a Hartford Comic Con I decided I was going to make a book for it.  I  wanted to make the book from one of my favorite comics out there, Lady Mechanika.  I did not want to use one of my many copies of the comic so I had to find a book that was a duplicate to one that I already owned.  (Yes, I am one of those people who collects the many different covers.)  That was not an easy feat.  The book is very hard to come by now, so it took some calling, driving to different shops but I finally found one about an hour from me.

The book started out looking just like any other comic book. I was a little worried to take the comic apart and use it, afraid I would mess it up some how, either gluing or cutting it.  One mistake would lead to a very frustrated and mad me.  Needless to say with all the worry I took my time with it.

Over all the book took me just over a week start to finish including the pressing and drying times.  The front cover of the book is the front cover of the comic.  The signatures are surround by the cut interior pages of the comic (I wish I could have kept them full size.)  I kept them in order so you can at least read the first pages of the signatures in order. The interior pages are the Toned Gray Strathmore sketch paper.  The back cover of the book I took the Recollections Clocks paper and water colored it with some Tim Holtz Distress Stains.  I Coptic stitch bound the book with some variegated brown and beige cotton thread that I waxed with local bees wax.

My Lady Mechanika comic book book!

Back and Front Covers.

Inside the Front Cover.

Inside Pages.

I brought the comic book turned sketch book to the Con with me.  Joe Benitez, creator and artist for Lady Mechanika, was set up there as well.  I was very lucky to be able to get him to do the very first sketch in the book.  <3

So now the book will be traveling with me to shows and cons, when ever I can get to them, to have others do sketches in it as well. I'm thinking a steampunk theme is in order but that was apparent from the start.

The making of a mixed media journal

I love being able to combine all different types if media when working on a project. This book was made over the course of a few days.

First I had a picture in my head of what I wanted the base cover to look like, so I gathered what I thought I would need for supplies. Tissue paper, inks, mists, glue, string and book board to work on.

Next came the layering... Starting with the twine. I glued the twine to the book board in the pattern/design I wanted.  Then layered on pieces of tissue paper.  Once dry, inks and shimmers were added until I like the way it looked.

After all that was dry I added embellishments.   Some fabric flowers, brass key and leaf, and a filigree button with black rhinestones.  

Then it was a matter of assembling the final note book with lined pages and a black wire spiral.
It is currently available for purchase at my Etsy shop.  

Mini Pocket Page Book

I think I've mentioned before that over the Christmas season Prima Marketing ran a wonderful warehouse box sale.  I picked up a couple of them and discovered my love of their products, thick papers, cute embellishments, and lovely flowers. 

I used their Londonerry line of papers to make this cute mini pocket book:

There are 8 pockets in total.  Each pocket has a tag, frame, note card or other piece of paper to journal on.  Add pictures to these cute pages and pockets to customize it. 

Here's my list of what I used for this project....
The book is made form the Londonerry sheet of paper "Finick Finack" #843113
The cards, tags and insert pieces were from Londonerry Papers "Manor House" #843144 and "Bradshaw" #843151
The front embellishments are from a variety of sets.  The orange, yellow and black flower, along with the leaves and vine are from "Gracie Vine Doodle-Deux" #555825.  The blue rose with the gold tipped petals is "Coventry Rose Romantique" #553302.  The large brown flow is  form the "Brown Floral Embellishments" #713546.  In the middle of it all is the Finick Finack "Londondary Chipboard Sticker" #551230.

To help finish off the edges of the pockets, the seams of the pages and the spine of the book, I used a Nami Nami tape from Jet Pens.

Booklaces

What is a booklace?

Well simply it's a book necklace.  It is also far more than that......

These have started making an appearance in my stores and I wanted to share just exactly what they are.  They were designed to be a fun and fashionable way to always have paper with you to take notes, jot down lists or simply pass off a note or number to someone else.  They are all handmade and unique.

Lets start off by talking about the chains.  The chains are long to extra long in length.  The lengths of the chains vary but the average is 32"- 36" long.  I wanted something that if I'm heading out the door I can just slip on and not have to fuss with clasps and what not.  Some chains will still come with clasps but should not have to be used unless you want to. These should easily slip over your head and will come in a wide variety to match the books that come with them.  Each end of the chain will have a ring that simply slides on to the binder rings of the book to attach the book to the chain.

Moving on to the books.  The books measure 2" wide by 2.5" tall.  The start off with book board and a selected cover paper.  As with all my books a pH neutral PVA book binders glue is used. The covers of the book are punched and fitted with eyelets to help prevent any wear from the rings.  The book just grow from there based on my inspirations.  There will be some steampunk and tons of floral. I bought a ton of gorgeous Prima Marketing embellishments and flower so those will definitely be seen on books.  You'll just have to keep checking to see the new ones that appear.

The paper inside - To start the booklaces come with 50 plain white pages of 28 lb paper, heavier than you standard printer paper.  If you don't want the plain, 50 sheets of standard lined paper can be put in instead simply by making a note and letting me know at check out.  Other options might develop such as colored paper, which I have a ton of so just ask if you are looking for some, along the way. 

Pencils.  Well with every notebook a writing utensil is needed or how else would you write in it.  Instead of fumbling for a pen or pencil in your bag, purse or pocket the pencil is chained to the necklace.  No worries about forgetting it or losing it.  The pencils are attached to the chain via a swivel clasp.  The swivel allows for the pencil to be used with out the chain tangling up.  The clasp allows you to remove the pencil and place it on the dominate side of the chain or just take it off completely.  You might even prefer it attached to something else, maybe a key chain or zipper or something entirely different the option is yours.  These will also be available separately so if you need a replacement, mix and match or just want the pencil, they will be there.  ***NOTE: Because these pencils are hand wrapped with a matching paper then sealed the best way to sharpen them is with a knife or razor.***

The over all book itself....It's unique feature is that it is total replaceable, interchangeable and customizable.  Simply open the binder rings and a whole other world awaits.  The chains are the first to come off, simply slide the rings of the chains off and slide another one on.  Next take a cover off or both covers off. You need to take one off to replace the paper but if you want you can mix and match your covers. One the cover is off switch out the old paper for the new, replace the cover, the chain and close the binder rings. All parts are replaceable and interchangeable so have fun and be sure to check out ArtFire or Etsy for your booklaces.

Lots of New This New Year!!

 

First; I'd like to thank everyone who supported Crafty Day Dreams, your support means so much to me!

Second; I want to wish everyone a very happy and healthy new year. I decided not to partake in the New Year's resolutions this year for a few reasons, the biggest one being that I normal do not succeed very well at them. I have decided to take on some goals for myself instead. One of these goals is to try to blog more and show maybe more in progress stuff. I'd like to maybe do some videos too. Second goal is to get everything that I have made photographed and listed in my stores. Surprisingly I have a ton of items made that I just have not found the time to photograph and list.


Third; Be on the look out for some great new items coming your way this new year. There will be a wide variety of new items appearing in my stores.  Booklaces will be making a appearance after a some good feedback from the lucky person to receive the prototype.  Adjustments have been made and the original improved upon. Start looking for these in the up and coming weeks.  Be sure to keep checking back to see what's been added to the store. :)

Stampin Sketch Book pt 2

To continue on with my little Bloom Mae stamp, that I had colored in the previous post, I decided to use her on a book cover. I wanted something cute to go along with her. I chose out a section of paper from BoBunny's Back To Backs 12" Sophie Cut Outs.  The section that I chose was the section that says "Beautiful Inside & Out."  I figured that with this the book would have to be coptic stitched because the cut out that I chose would loose to much if I wrapped it around the book board.

I took my book board, cut to 6" x 6", and glued a glue piece of coordinating blue scrapbook paper down to it for both the back and the front covers, inside and out.  I waxed up some cotton hot pink thread with some locally sourced bees wax and placed a few stitches on the BoBunny cut out, one in the upper right and two in the lower left corners.  Then I glued this one down to one the now blue book board that will become the front cover.  I wanted to give the covers a sort of aged look so I took some really fine grit sand paper and sanded all around the edges.  Then I used some Distress Stain, antique linen, to give it an aged look.

Once that was all done I worked on the signatures. For the signatures, or sections of folded paper that make up the book, I used  Canson 90lb drawing paper.  To dress up the book a little bit more I decided to use a bright pink card stock to go over the spine edge of the signatures.  The sewing thread is the same hot pink cotton one that I used to stitch in the cut out.   I decided where my holes were going to be for stitching and drilled/punched those in the cover and signatures. Then I stitched the book together and finally attached Mae to the cover with some double sided sticky foam.

Here is the finished book:

Stampin Sketch Book

I was following someone on Facebook who happened to post a link to a wonderfully fun stamping site called Some Odd Girl.  I decided to check them out.

It turns out that they have some really awesome digital stamp and clear stamps. I've always loved the idea of digital stamps since I heard about them in my Copic certification class but I've never actually bought or used one...until now.  I found this really cute stamp that I just had to have called Bloom Mae.

Isn't she the cutest thing?  I think she's just fabulous.  The digi stamps come with both a JPEG and a PNG file.  I used Photoshop to downsize the stamp to the size that I wanted to use.  I printed her out and let the ink set over night.  Then I colored her using Copic sketch markers and cut her out.

Here's the list of what I used:

Skin - E000, E01, E11

Hair - E51, E35, E25, E29

Dress - BG11, BG13, BG34

Flower and Trim on Dress - RV11, RV19, RV34

Flower stem - G21, G24

Eyes - BG11, BG13

On a side note; I have found out that HAMMERMILL Color Copy Digital Cover 60lb is very Copic marker friendly.  I think that it colors very similar to the actual Copic paper. That is if you can find it.  I have a very hard time finding the paper where I live and often times have to order it.

What does this little stamp have to do with a sketch book or my love of making books? Well stay tuned my next post will show you just exactly what I was able to do with little miss Mae.

Inks and Cookbooks

I've been busy lately. I wanted to give inking a shot so hubby said I needed to start off with brush inking, ha. He gave me a few books to read on inking and some videos to watch. I watched the videos and read over the books. Last time I was at the art store I bought a $18 white sable #2 brush. (It was cheaper than the Windsor Newton Series 7 because I can't see spending $40 on a brush just to goof off with.) I have to say that it holds it's shape well as long as it's loaded with ink and I don't try to use it when it's to dry.

I never do things the easy way so I started out with a picture off of Deviant Art"Fallen" by Rantz I fully inked this with a brush. After working on another picture and going back I see some things that I would do different, or at least I think I could make it look a little better. Anyway here it is - Left is original pencil and right is my inks:

I came across this site seanellery.com and he has a bunch of pencils on there for people to ink so I grabbed "Arwyn" - by Marcio Abreu This one came out better. I inked all with the brush except for the hair and some of the leaves which were inked with a Micron pen. Same - Original pencil on the left and my inks on the right:

Anyway I'll do more inking and practice when I get time. In the meantime I have a cookbook I'm working on basically publishing for someone. I helped design the cover and back. I'm printing it and physically hand making / binding each book. :D I'm excited to be doing this. It's going to be a spiral bound book instead of a hard sewn bound book. This way someone can fold it over, lay it flat or have it sit nicely on a book holder without having to worry about it closing on them or creasing the spine.

Right now I have everything needed for the books ordered. I cut the book board for the covers and the sheets of paper for the interior of the covers. Here's the stack of board for 25 books:

I still have work to do on page layouts and getting all the recipes to fit right onto the pages and making sure all the formatting is the same. I think that is what is actually going to take the longest. I'll post more pictures of the progress of the books as I can. :)

Mini Leather Books

I recently came across a few suede leather scraps and figured I'd give a go at making a book with the scraps. I got both purple (my favorite color) and tan leather that is so soft. I thought they would make lovely books. The scraps, however, are just that scraps. They are not very big at all. I typically save any of my cuts from other books I've made in the past for just such occasions where I want to make a little book. The cuts work out perfectly for littler books. I trim down the scrap cuts to the size I will need to make my book, fold them in half, and make signatures out of them. Typically on my smaller books I like to stick with four sheets per signature because the sketch paper tends to be so thick that anymore just wouldn't work. Once I have all the signatures made I look at and played with different ways of wrapping the leather around them to help me determine where on the leather they would get sewn. After making up my mind with where I think they should go I selected my thread and started long stitching them into the leather. This was way easier said than done. I figured nice soft leather, nice long sharp book binding needle shouldn't be a problem...boy was I wrong. That nice soft leather is a pain in the rear to try to get a needle though. I had to position my needle where I wanted it and then us the table top to help force the needle though the leather. I think that after this I just might need to invest in some leather working needles, or at least some stronger needles. The book binding needles tend to break at the eye if there's to much force or pull on them. I've broken a few in the past experimenting with stab bound books. I do have to say that I love the way they turned out. I added some colored jump rings to the spines to turn them into necklaces / key chains. You'll definitely be seeing more little leather books and possibly some big ones (if I can find somewhere to get big leather) in the future. :D

Here's the two that I made: Brown Leather & Purple Leather

Day 55 - Altered book

Today was an interesting day. Started out with a delay for the kids which I never look forward to, it just throws my whole day way off. Once the kiddos were off I had to head to the post office to ship an order and then to the grocery store. Want to know just how fast gas prices are rising out here? Well I drove by the gas station on my way to the store it was $3.849. I did my shopping and started to head over to McDonald's to grab my one and only shamrock shake of the season and the price was $3.899. That means it went up five whole cents in a half an hour. I refuse to buy gas in my state, I go to the next state over where it's at least thirty cents cheaper. But I digress. It's ridiculous just how fast they are rising. Everyday the gas station raises it's prices.

Anyway, I drove by the gas station (with my eyes bulging out of my head in surprise at the jump in price) and headed to the drive thou at McDonald's. I figured I'd spend my extra points on this shake and only limit it to one for the season. I love the shamrock shake so I'm sad that I only get one but one is better than none. I paid for the order and the cashier gave me back my change. As we pulled away something wasn't right. I looked at my change. The ten dollar bill didn't seem right. We pulled into a parking space and examined it more closely. It was off and something was wrong, it was smaller than my other bills. So we took the bill to the bank. They tested it with all their tests but couldn't find anything wrong except....get this... the whole image was shrunk about 1/8". Well what the hell? If you lined up one border the one on the opposite side was short by about an eight of an inch. Lovely. Now what the heck am I suppose to do with this? The bank didn't offer me a new one to replace this one they just said..you know there have been counterfeit bills circulating in the area lately but the serial numbers don't match those you should be fine but you could take it down to the police and have them look at it. Sigh. (It's already been a long day but I don't want to risk the bill being a counterfeit.) We call the police who come and take my ten dollars. (now I'm broke..sigh) They said that it will be sent to the secret service (pretty darn cool) to be analyzed and if it's real I'll get my ten dollars back and if not I'm out the ten dollars. (OMG! Are you kidding me? I didn't ask to be handed this bill...I better get ten dollars in the mail!) Then he sent us on our merry way.

It's just been one of those days...So I decided to do some painting and playing with medium.

Day 48 - Birthday Present

This past week was my grandma's birthday. I figured I'd go and make her something small. A little mini note book that she can carry in her purse or put by her phone to make notes in. I was making it today and ran into a little problem. One that I'm sure grandma wouldn't mind, as grandma likes the special handmade gifts, even with there flaws. I..um...well...wasn't paying attention when I glued down the light yellow paper and the picture and...well...I glued it on upside down and backwards. (sooooo mad at myself for not checking before I glued. It's like the carpenters rule - measure twice, cut once. It should have been check twice on the orientation of the papers and glue once.) Sigh. It's one of those things I can't believe I made that mistake, so disappointed that I did it. And I really liked the notebook too. I'm sure that grandma will love it regardless of the mess up. Heck she might not even notice, (or at least I can hope that she doesn't notice.)

Day 32 - Gears Steampunky Journal

Today I did another recover. I took apart a smaller journal and recovered it with a steampunk theme in mind. The cover paper is a grey and has glossy gears all over it. On the front cover I add a few metal gears too. Seeing how I already showed you how I recover journals in a previous post I won't bore you with all the details again. Instead I'll get right to it:

Day 27 - Green Onions and What to use on Black Cardstock.

I came across this video thanks to CFRM.

I of course had to check this out and see if this was in fact true. The whole thing seemed kind of weird to me. I'm use to cutting the top off something, ie pineapple, and rooting that or rooting branches, as in having things grow roots not having roots grow things. Could this really be possible?

I am pleased to say that after going out and buying some green onions to use on my nachos the other night that it does in fact work. It kinda creeps the kids out that there's a green thing growing out something that you just chopped off but it is also amazingly cool. I'm thinking that the white part of the green onion is similar to a bulb and thus why this works so well. Check it out:

To do this I cut the white part with the roots off my green onion and put them in a small glass, standing up the best that I could do, with some water in it, and placed it on the window sill. I read some where in the comments on the video to do this to get the roots re-hydrated. A few days later and you have what's seen in the picture. I went out today and got some potting soil and will be potting them this weekend (still to cold to plant outside.) What a way to save some money and grow some great plants both indoors and outdoors. :)

Back to the chalkboard book and the black card stock. I know people are probably wondering...What do I use on the black card stock you made your book out of? Well I have a picture of some of some of the things that I use. At the top of the left hand paper I used a silver gel pen, that didn't work very well and it's tough to see. Under that I used a white Gelly Roll gel pen and that is a nice bright white against the black. Just under that is a ordinary white colored pencil followed by a orange Signo uni-ball pen and another colored pencil, this one yellow. The paper to the left is all colored pencils from both Design and Prismacolor. I would also imagine that pastels would work as well on the black paper but I did not have any handy to try it out.

Day 26 - Finished Book

I finished the magnetic chalkboard book today. I poked the holes in the crease of the signatures using a small awl and picked out a purple embroidery thread to bind the book with. I think that it came out pretty cool and I'm happy with the results. You just might see smaller versions or similar books to this one as well. Right now the book is in the final stages of being done. It's getting pressed. The Coptic stitch is nice on books like these because it allows room for the signatures to open and the book to lay flat. I might if I can find a good price on some leather try some covers similar to this with a leather spine instead of the Coptic stitch. Finishing a book always makes me happy. :)

Day 25 - It's starting to come together

OMG! Let me start off by telling you I had the most amazing thing to eat yesterday, and by amazing I mean so not healthy for you. It's called a dirt bomb and I could eat a dozen of them. I got it from a little place in the village called Blue Squid. When I was in there a little dome sat over these things with a label on it that read "Dirt Bomb." Hmmm...curiosity set in and come to find out a "Dirt Bomb" is a doughnut that's been baked in a muffin tin (not to bad right....here comes the not so good for you but wickedly tasty part,) dipped in butter and dredged in cinnamon and sugar. All I can say is AMAZING!!!! I spit one with hubs in the car and immediately wished we would have bought all that were under the glass dome. So if you're ever down in the village (Olde Mystick Village) give up the diet for one day stop by there and grab one of these amazing little things.

Now for today's crafty creative little bit, well it's actually quite a bit. I conditioned the chalkboard paint, works great by the way, and drilled holes in the wood for where it will be bound.

I cut out paper for the pages, I choose a heavy black card stock. I figured I'd go for an artsy sort of book. One for chalk (hence the chalkboard cover,) gel pens, pastels and the like that really pop on black paper. I folded them and they are being pressed right now.

I also covered the inside of the covers of the book with a decorative paper and punched the sewing holes though the paper. Tomorrow hopefully I'll get the pages sewn in. :)

Day 24 - Book cover contiuned

Today I continued to work on the wood book cover. I've never worked with wood but I imagine it won't be much different than working with book boards. I let the last of four coats of the magnetic paint dry over night. I'm satisfied with the fourth coat. The attraction is better I probably could have gone for a fifth but like I said I'm satisfied with four.

Tonight I painted over the magnetic paint with a black paint. I chose a black craft smart® chalkboard paint to cover the magnetic paint. That's right the cover of this book is going to be a magnetic black board. :) This chalkboard paint has similar instructions to the magnetic. Dry one hour between coats, (again it didn't take an hour to dry,) 2 coats of paint one in each direction and let it cure for 24 hours. The paint at first seems thin and I wasn't sure how it would cover. Though painting over a dark grey I'm sure helped. It did take the two coats to get even coverage and even now I'm debating on a third coat. It's now drying for the 24 hours and we'll see tomorrow how it conditions when the time comes.

Day 23 - The start of a book

I was in Michael's today and I saw this really neat Magnetic Paint by Martha Stewart Crafts­­™ and this wicked cool idea for a book popped into my head, well at least I think it's cool. So I picked up some boards, wood boards and painted them with this magnetic paint. It's a light grey which dries darker than it looks. It smells horrific, absolutely disgusting, making me wish it was summer and I could paint the boards with the windows open. I braved though the smell though. The paint is super thick, like molding paste thick and needs to be stirred before use. The container says that it is suppose to dry 1 hour between coats but it seemed to dry a lot faster than that. It could be the heat by my desk helping it dry faster, I'm not sure but it definitely did not take an hour. I use the recommended three coats and tested out a small magnet on it. The magnet sticks to the board but the attraction could be a bit better so I opted for a fourth coat which I just put on. Once this one is dry I'll try it out again. The instructions on the bottle also say to let it dry for 24 hours before painting over it with a craft paint. So here it sits for now:

Day 20 - Recovered Spiral Journal and Video

Today I took a spiral bound journal ripped it apart and recovered it, embellished it and made a video of the process I used to do it. :) So here it is.