Elise's Pieces: A blog about everything

Homemade stationery at its weirdest?? Probably not. =)

How I Got Started Making Books

It's not a secret that I've been into blank books my entire life... but I didn't start making them until about a year and a half ago.

When I was young, my mother bought me a journal for my school work. I was homeschooled.

My assignment was to write journal entries. I'm not sure what they were supposed to be about, or why I was supposed to write them. Probably to work on my writing and spelling skills, I suppose.

I still have that journal. I started writing in it when I was 9 years old, and I haven't stopped writing in journals since. Sometimes it's been a spiral bound notebook and other times I had an actual journal with a lock. (The locked ones were best for me, because my sisters always tried to read my journals.)

I know I lost many of my spiral bound notebooks, but I keep a box of my old journals hidden away. I love to look back on them, although I think sometimes it's kind of horrifying the things that I wrote, why couldn't they have been more interesting... sometimes non-stop boy talk. I can't stand boy talk... lol.

The summer before last, my sister, Ami (I have 4 sisters, by the way.), introduced me to Etsy.com. I really wanted to join, but I really didn't do much as far as crafting. I drew. I love to draw, but I didn't think that would really be something I could sell on Etsy.

So, I started my shop in June 2009, and by the time July rolled around, I figured out that bookmaking was what I wanted to do. Journals are a passion of mine, why not make them, too?

I started out following tutorials on YouTube. I didn't sew my books. All that they needed was paper and glue. It's a great way to make them, but these days I prefer sewing and gluing my books.

Since my meager start with YouTube tutorials (not that they were bad... they were great tutorials!), I've even begun to design my books without following a particular pattern or tutorial.

I still love to look at book making books. They give me new ideas and are great for inspiration! I love to look at the pictures and only read the instructions when I'm really curious. :)

I hope this helps anyone who was wondering how all of this began.

- Elise

Saturday, July 23, 2011

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