I bet that just about every craft blogger out there has a SouleMama post that sends them sprinting for the worktable, & mine was the one about the tiny books. My kids are dedicated artists & storytellers (especially my daughter, who loves narrative like nobody I've ever met, except maybe me, which I suspect is sometimes very, very tiring to the men in our household), we have teetering piles of pads & notebooks & story pages & drawings all over the place, & still it had never occurred to me to have a stack of little books around waiting to be filled up instead of waiting to bind the finished product.
I had the cardstock & paper, but no working stapler. I did, however, have plenty of embroidery floss, a longtime love for the book arts, & an inability to pass up the opportunity to make something just a little bit more complex in the name of aesthetics. Though, really, simple stitched books like this are barely harder than stapled ones.
Cut a sheet of cardstock in half (to 8.5" wide x 5.5" tall), then cut six sheets of paper to 8.25" wide by 5.5" tall. (Trimming that 1/4" will keep your pages from sticking out from the edges of the cover when the book is done.)
Fold the cardstock in half (to 4.25" x 5.5"), then do the same with the stack of paper. A bone folder will give a nice crisp crease.
Put the cardstock on top of the stack of pages, matching at the fold line, then clip together on one end. Punch three holes along the crease. I happened to have a spring action "anywhere" punch around, so I punched 1/16" holes, but you can use anything that will make a small hole, really.
Using 3 strands of an 11" piece of embroidery floss, take your needle down through the center hole,
up through one end (leave a long enough tail at center to tie a square knot),
down through the other end,
& back up through the center hole.
Use the ends to tie a knot around the long stitch
& you're done. Barely more time than stapling, right?
My kids spent the entire afternoon with these.
ENTIRE. I am not exaggerating.
EDIT: My punch is the "instant setter" from Making Memories, which I picked up at my local stamping store when I needed to set some Paper Source snaps into wedding programs without ruining the smooth tops. I like it fine & use the hole-punch tips pretty often, though I don't think it's that much quieter than the old-school individual hit-with-hammer "anywhere" punches I already had (I see Making Memories has a lo-tech punch-only version too). Keep in mind, though, that you don't need fancy scrapbooking tools for this project: try an awl, or a hammer & small nail.
Great idea! I gotta say, I love Soule Mama, but I like your version better. They loook so sweet and colorful stacked together like that. Thanks for sharing!
Posted by: knitsational | April 30, 2008 at 07:25 AM
Oh your books are so adorable! Using some of your ideas I made a quick book for my little one and posted about it on my moms blog: Laugh-learn-Love@blogspot.com. Now that I see how easy it is, I'll make some nicer ones, with cardstock covers. Thanks for the idea.
Posted by: Deneal | May 02, 2008 at 03:35 PM
nice n, handy
Posted by: kako ito | May 08, 2008 at 05:41 PM
Absolutely adorable! Thank you SO much for sharing how you made these gorgeous books. :0)
Posted by: Mel M. M. M. | July 29, 2008 at 08:12 PM
Great idea using the clamps to keep the paper in place. I always just bind our books with a longer stitch on the sewing machine, but sometimes the paper moves.
Posted by: metrosupial designs | July 30, 2008 at 04:59 PM
Great idea using the clamps to keep the paper in place. I always just bind our books with a longer stitch on the sewing machine, but sometimes the paper moves.
Posted by: metrosupial designs | July 30, 2008 at 05:08 PM
Awesome! Thanks for the great tutorial!
Posted by: Tina | August 15, 2008 at 08:38 AM
I've been busy making these for my boys the last few days. They are awesome! Thanks so much! I love the use of embroidery floss instead of staples. It just makes it "nicer" somehow. I was having difficulty finding something to make the tiny holes, so I decided to use my sewing machine needle (note to self: change needle before beginning new sewing project) to punch the holes in the paper. That worked great, and it's a nice, tiny hole that fits the embroidery floss perfectly.
Posted by: Tina | August 20, 2008 at 06:16 AM
Your blog is beautiful. I love the photo of the stack of books. I've made these for my kids and they love them. Now I can't look at little scraps or half-sheets of paper in the same way. It all looks like a book about to happen.
Posted by: Heather | November 11, 2008 at 08:10 PM
I loved this idea so much, I sat down and made ten today. Primary colors, for my son's little girlfriend (he's 5, she's 4). They are really easy to make, he made a few before other things were more interesting. I'm going to have to invest in another hole punch though, I have one of those bang-on-it eyelet setters and I guess I killed it today.
Posted by: Holly | November 20, 2008 at 06:03 PM
This is fantastic!! I think I'll make and wrap large ones for under-the-tree and some mini-books for the stockings!
Posted by: Sun-Kissed Savages | November 22, 2008 at 08:12 PM
I would have loved to make some of these as a kid! I know a few kiddos who are going to be very happy when mommy makes some of these for them. :)
Posted by: LyB | December 12, 2008 at 05:30 PM
Martha Stewart Crafts (and her display at Michaels) has a Screw Punch and so does Making Memories, just search their sites. I just use an awl and a hammer b/c somehow $25 seems pretty steep. That said it does come with a few different tips.
Posted by: airlia | May 01, 2009 at 02:19 PM
What a great blog, you write so interesting things about good stuff
i would like to stay in touch with your blog, thanks!!!
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