Earmarks: Custom Bound #1

This one's a bit more technical. I try to explain as much as I can, but if you have any questions, feel free to ask me!

A side note: I won't be at the farmer's market this Saturday, as I'm helping with an event at my church. I'll see you all at the market next week!

I just finished a fun project yesterday. It was a custom bound book that a grandfather had created for his grandson. His grandson lives in France and will grow up speaking French, so the grandfather took some photographs of his cat and wrote a story about the cat (Scooter) in English. I was really looking forward to working on this, but it presented a lot of challenges. The urge to swear was definitely there a couple times.

First, all of the pages were 8.5"x11", and were printed so that they couldn't be folded to be sewn as a book. This is what you normally do. My solution was to use the Accordion Pleat Spine from Peter and Donna Thomas. This worked great for grouping the pages together, but the paper was so heavy, it needed extra support. So I also sewed the accordion onto three tapes to provide the needed strength.

The part where things got frustrating was when I went to glue the bookcloth onto the boards. I discovered that my cloth was half an inch too short, so I had to create some way of covering that still looked good. I was inspired by this http://www.jonathanwinters.com/images/01talesblue.jpg to create a half cloth book, that's actually all cloth. So far, so good, right? But then, I forgot that the picture of the cat was supposed to be in the cover, and had to take off the cloth after it'd already been glued. When I reattached it, glued seeped through in spots. This is where the swearing came in. Thankfully, I was able to get the glue out with a wet washcloth. Finally, it was ready to go in the press to dry.

So that's the story of Scoot the cat's book. It had its share of challenges, but it ends happily, as I'm meeting the grandfather today to deliver the book!