As promised.

Here are a few pictures of my newest coptic journal available in my etsy shop here:

I love how the coptic stitching looks like braiding. I wasn't sure about the color of the thread I used, but once it was finished I couldn't imagine it with any other color.

Making the journal was a blast too. First I made all of the sheets of paper, which took quite a while. There are 55 sheets total, which when folded in half makes 110 pages, 220 front and back. Then I trimmed them to size and as I made the sheets over a period of days, I also made the covers. I reclaimed some scrap chipboard and cardboard and aged and distressed a sheet of paper. Then once I covered the cardboard with the paper, I drew on the islands and such and added the edging and inside cover paper. The inside cover paper is a gold metallic tissue paper, which proved a problem once when the first layer I put on got a hole torn in it as I smoothed it down because the glue had made it too wet. Oh well. The second go-round worked out better. Altogether I am very happy with this journal and look forward to making more.

Also, a picture of my dog in the snow:

Paper tutorials

While browsing etsy I came across thelongread's top 100 free tutorials of 2008. Looking through them, I found two involving creative uses of paper, so I thougth I would pass them along and give a few nods toward these blogs.

Paper mache bowls are nothing new, in fact the art of paper mache has been around since the Chinese were making helmets out of it as far back as 202 B.C. However, Painted Fish Studio shows us an alternative to the dull text-riddled use of grey newsprint with a tutorial for paper mache bowls. Simple, easy, looks great with a handmade decorating scheme or to use as a place to throw your keys at night so you don't walk around the next morning, late for work, wondering if the dog/cat/baby ran off with them.

Just Like Martha shows us a creative way to use up old magazines. It's a bit past Christmas at the moment (and no help if you're non-Christian unless you have a secret ambission to make a paper forest display for your home), but still, when the holidays roll around again, I'll be sure to make at least one of these magazine Christmas trees.

In other news, I have finished my third coptic-stitched journal and intend to photograph them tonight and upload the pictures to my computer along with the shots of my dog playing in the banks of snow taller than her. I'll share the journal-making goodness and snow-puppy adorableness later tonight.

I promise, she's cute, even if you're not a dog person. She looks more like an Ewok from Star Wars.

My bad.

Excuse the extended absence if you would please. My hard drive crashed before the holidays, then during and after the holidays and when school started back up again, I actually forgot I had a blog. Oops.

At any rate, here's an update:

The new couching material I've been using has been excellent. The squares of old bed sheet work wonderfully! Almost every sheet of paper I make is high enough quality to be sold in my etsy shop. I'm very pleased.

Also, I've decided to introduce a new product into my etsy shop. I am using my handmade paper to bind journals. I have recently learned the coptic binding technique with the help of this site and have made two small journals already and am working on a third. I have not posted them to my shop yet though.

Also, the Etsy Papermakers Guild has been organizing a paper swap among 15 of its members, so in the beginning of next week I will be sending off 15 of my sheets and will recieve 14 sheets back from the other members (the 15th sheet will be my won sheet, which I've already seen, ha ha) sometime in the coming weeks. I am very excited to see the products from other members.

I will update you with photos of my journals and the paper swap as soon as they are available. In the mean time, check back for more paper making madness!

Long time, I know.

Well, I could provide a multitude of excuses explaining why I haven't posted in weeks, some of which include the remnants of a hurricane causing a week-long power outage, school, being kidnapped by my pets....

Anyway, here's what's been going on in the paper-making venue:

I've started making pocket-notebooks for my etsy shop. I take the white (or mostly white, as long as there's no writing or pictures) bits of the stack of office paper in my room, tear it into equal strips and fold it into single singnature mini notebooks like the little pink one on the left. (Note: a signature is one section of pages in a bound book.)

I also have started a new line of handmade paper envelopes that are larger than the originals.

I've finished one of the big custom orders that I had as of last time I posted, and it has been sent, recieved, and loved. I'm nearly done with the second order, and only have about 14 more sheets of paper to make.

I'm also trying a new couching material, or will be as soon as it is finished through the washer and dryer. A bit of paper-making terminology defined: "Couching" is when you press the piece of paper that is on the mold (part of the mold and deckle set-up) onto a piece of material (newspaper, felt, cloth, etc) to soak up the excess water.

In the past I have used newspaper with limited success. Most of the time fine wrinkles develop in the sheet of newspaper and it flaws my paper, so only a small percentage of the sheets I make are high enough quality to sell as handmade paper sheets in my shop. I'm hoping this new couching material (a torn worn out bedsheet) will reduce the wrinkles and increase the percentage of sheets that I make that are high quality.

For more information on learning to make paper, see this site. It makes things a little more specific than they need to be (honestly, I don't use the deckle portion of the mold and deckle, and it isn't necessary to use tissue paper or paper towels, discarded office paper is fine).

Practice makes....

I'm very bad at this whole "posting-once-a-week" thing. I won't bother you with excuses.

So here's what's up with my crafts lately:

I'm halfway done with the binding of my first attempt at a journal with a sewn binding. It is my fourth journal total, but in the past I was using bindings with glued spines. This one uses no glue in the binding, and it turning out rather well. I do need to work on the width of my bindings however, because this one is too wide for how many signitures I have in it. It could have looked better if I'd had a thinner spine. Oh well. One thing I like about these journals is that each time I have learned something significant. I've gotten a new job at a local library, and after I've been there a while, I am hoping they will let me into the restoration department and there they will teach me how to bind books and make new covers for old books more professionally. At the moment my skills are self taught and based off what I've found on the internet. I'm really looking forward to learning something there.

Also, I've added international shipping to my etsy shop and as a result immediately recieved two requests for large custom orders of paper. This has taught me the need for keeping a stock of already made paper, so I don't have to make two orders, totalling over 80 sheets of paper, at the same time. Lesson learned.

I'm seeing Halloween decorations on the street now, and as a result, am beginning to worry about Christmas. It's my understanding that ALL stores pick up at Christmas, so after these two custom orders are filled, I am going to start stocking up in anticipation of the Christmas rush.

I also need to work on some card designs. When my favorite art supply store went out of business, I bought several large sheets of paper in different colors and patterns, and two of them are red and green. One is red on one side and green on the other, the second sheet is the same way, except the red side has green Christmas trees on it and the green side has red Christmas trees on it. It would make wonderful cards if I could just figure out an appealing design.

BAD DRAGON!

Okay, so I didn't keep to my goal of posting every Sunday. I'll keep working on it.

In other news, I have been keeping up with my crafts. I recieved a special order from a coworker for a sheet of blue handmade paper, so that is finished and currently drying. Another half-baked project is a box covered in recycled magazine pages. So far I have one side done and lots of work ahead of me. Because of repeated requests, I have ordered some flat rate envelopes yesterday from the USPS so I can implement international shipping in my etsy shop. I also made a card from my handmade paper and some old magazines (I have far too many laying around, so I am using them whenever possible). You can see the card in my shop here.

I'll try to be better about keeping up on my posts.

Enter: the Dragon

Well, I've finally decided that, having recently opened an etsy shop, I should also start a blog about what I do. I don't hope to gain fame and fortune (although that would be WONDERFUL), but I do hope to further expose myself and my crafts, and motivate myself to be more creative and adventureous. I also hope this blog will serve as an easy place for people to comment about my work, offer suggestions, things they'd like to see or have discussed.

So, with that having been said, I'll tell you about what I do. I'm an avid fan of dragons (to the point where I wrote my senior research paper in high school about them) and I have a love for working with paper. So my etsy shop was named after those two things, as well as the surname of a loved one.

My shop is quite new, but my experience with paper is not, though I'm by no means a master craftsperson. However, as I am further exploring the possibilities with paper, I am expanding my crafts and my skills. I work with paper in many forms. I make my own paper at home out of things friends and family would have otherwise pitched or recycled. I also use commercially produced paper and alter said papers to create my art. With this I make drawing paper, scrapbook paper, handmade envelopes, handbound journals, boxes, cards, and artist trading cards, to name a few things. I branch out from time to time (to keep from getting bored) so now and then I might interrupt my paper crafting posts with ones about polymer lcay, woodworking, woodburning, drawing, or who knows what. I get my grubby little fingers into a lot of things and am a notorious packrat.

My goal is to post at least once a week, to keep myself involved in my crafts and to make sure I keep making things, so look for a new post each Sunday. I tend to start projects and then leave them halfway done for a long time. Writing about them will (hopefully) motivate me to keep going start to finish.

At the moment I am in the middle of binding a journal with pages made of my handmade paper. It's going nicely, but slowly. It's a learning process. At the moment, I have made three (and a half) journals out of my paper, and each one has been a significant improvement from its predecessors. Even though it isn't perfect, I am proud of my journal and am anxious to see it finished. When it is, I will be sure to post pictures.

Also, today I purchased a book called Paper Transformed: A Handbook of Surface-Design Recipes and Creative Paper Projects by Julia Andrus. It has a lot of neat projects that I hope to incorporate into my work. Once I finish some half-baked projects I have going, I intend to go through it page by page and use each technique in some kind of project.

Now I need to find my thread and finish that journal....