Folding Book For Colleague

Our work colleague Sam (the gorgeous blonde on the 3rd picture) is leaving Amtrak and my hubby has worked with her for over 6 years and asked me if I could make something special for her as a leaving card.

I wanted to do something different, but didn't know what. I was browsing through the Docrafts gallery and found a folding book that Joanna Wolska had uploaded and she said she had instructions on her blog . A couple of clicks away and I knew exactly what I was going to do.

Joanna is Polish but her instructions are in English too and were very easy to follow. I had a practice with paper first. I am glad I decided to do that as I felt it needed to be larger and opted to make one with a finished size of 12.5 cm square. I am delighted with how the book came out, it took a lot of putting together (getting suitable photos and even having to take some to get the workmates together) but I felt it was worth it. They are presenting it to her on Tuesday when she leaves.

The papers used in the book have been an assortment from my stash from K & Co, Papermania and Dovecraft. I have embellished pages using ribbons, Papermania peeloffs, fabric sticker, metallic stickers cardstock stickers and silk flowers. I have also used Prima flowers and the centres are 3d metallic squashy dots that I got from Paperchase yesterday. They are ideal for when you need detail without adding bulk like brads or gems do. The triangular sections each house a tag which has been embellished with ribbons and eyelets. These have given an a lots of individual, double sided areas for people to write messages. When I made it I thought there might be too many but in the end some people had to 'overflow' onto the pages.


The box was embellished with a die cut K & Co Frame, Primas, Paperchase gems and Chipboards letters with Liquid Pearls dots.

I have also entered this into 2 challenges on Just Bex for a project using lots of ribbons and also one where an element is painted in some way.

Below is a slideshow of all the pages.

Ian's Leaving Scrapbook

A good friend at work is leaving to move up to Lancaster and I was asked to make a special leaving card for him. As he was Paul's immediate boss we know him quite well and he will be sorely missed. He has so much knowledge in his particular area of expertise I think they will struggle without him.

I decided to make a mini scrapbook, all of the pages are in the slideshow below.

He is passionate about a few things (Preston North End football team, Single Malt whisky and walking & cycling in the Lake District) so I encorporated them into the book which was assembled mainly by using images from the tinterweb printed on photo paper.

I have used backing papers from various sources and die cut lettering from Cuttlebug and Sizzlits, some Sizzlits diecuts a few stickers. There were a few pages at the back left for people to write on and I wrote a poem especially for him. I made a box for it to presented in but forgot to take a photo !

They gave it to him yesterday and he was overcome with emotion. He said he knew it must have taken a long time to do and really appreciated it.

Nanny's Birthday Book

One of my work colleagues asked me to make a special book for her. It was to be from 2 little girls for their Nanny's Birthday.

I was provided with loads of photo's of the 2 little cousins and set to work. It was decided that there should be some with them together and also some separate. Tash came up with the idea of handprints from each of the girls and I have left a page alongside so they can do their individual messages to their Nanny which would be a special touch that all Nanny's would appreciate I think.

She liked the same coloring as the previous book I made so I used the same paper for the cover. I added the chipboard circles and brads to wrap the closure round as this was a great mistake that I made on the first one. I just didn't anticipate the difficulty of keeping the book closed !

The patterned papers used inside are from various manufacturers and I used a sprinkling of Primas to embellish the pages.

The matching box and front of book were embellished using die cut lettering from Ellisons Curlie Girlie and Sizzlits extended cuts Wingo Zingo. The paper was a self adhesive irridescent film and the alphabets came out much better using this thinner medium.

I have done a Slideshow of all the pages below.

70th Birthday Book

I had been commissioned by one of my work colleagues to make a special book for her Step Mom's 70th Birthday. Karen has asked me to make a few things for her recently and each item has surpassed the last and I've got a reputation to uphold now!

I had the idea of making it a book with photo's of the people it was from and a space for them to write their own sentiment alongside.

The 6" square mini scrapbook started life as brown and pink and as the recipients favourite colour is purple that just wouldn't do. The trouble was, I didn't have any paper big enough so I used self adhesive irridescent film for the main cover, and used a strip of some gorgeous silver and lilac glittered wrapping paper that I bought from the NEC last year. Through out the project the only glitter is from this paper, I was absoloutely covered by the end !

I used some ribbon to cover the join of the 2 papers, and the sentiment on the front is Papermania peel offs.

The main pages are a photograph of family member with partner and a plain section to write on. these are all matted on various purple papers and embellished with Prima flowers.

In the middle of the book there are 2 poems to celebrate a mother.

I had intended to use gems for the middle of the flowers, but the book was getting so fat that I had to reduce the thickness. I had originally inserted lengths of ribbon between the covers of the book to tie it, but they were straining against the thickness so much that they would not hold it. The box had already been made and the thickness was as big as I could make it with A4 card so I couldn't make another so I came up with the idea of using a long length of ribbon to double wrap the book and this kept it together and small enough to go into the box. The box was embellished with peel off and I used a length of lilac organza ribbon to tie a bow for presentation. Karen was delighted with it and they were having a get together at the weekend for her birthday. I told her if her Mom doesn't cry I haven't done my job properly!

Below is a slideshow of the all the photos of this project

Leaving to Have a Baby Scrapbook

I have been Commissioned by my work colleagues to make a card for one of the girls who is leaving to have a baby and decided I was going to do something a bit different.

I have ended up making a scrapbook style book where there are plenty of spaces left to write messages inside.

I used one of those little scrapbooks from Poundland as the basis for my book and embellished it using paper, stickers, ribbons and rub-on sentiments.

I have created a slideshow to show all the pages of the book.