Star Book

I have had several projects on my desk which I finished quite some time ago but that I haven't blogged about yet and this star book is one example. It's one of Kiala Givehand's free videos on YouTube in a monthly series on book making. This was her June book. I didn't make her May book as it involved a book binding machine and I don't have one (although I'm thinking about it!). Kiala made this star book without content using gelli plate printed pages but I wanted to add text so instead I used coloured craft paper. Above is the front cover.

This is what the book looks like from the top and it explains why it's called a star book. I haven't added a closure and when folded the book is flat.

However when it is open it acquires the star shape and as a consequence is difficult to photograph. Above and below are some of the pages. I have used printed versions of my own photographs inside (printed by Printagram from my Instagram pictures) and on the front and back cover used two of my Polaroid pictures.
I also wrote a poem for this book using sentences from a vintage book. Here is the full text spread out over the pages:

For what then was I born?

The day-dream of deep thought

Shall all things else be in mystery.

The vision was sealed upon my soul

How small the glimpse of knowledge.

I saw, and asked not its name.

Reflection is a flower of the mind.

The glance of recollection.

As you can tell below on the back cover, I finished this book back in August and I love the shape although next time I would make a separate cover to go with it and a means of closing the pages.

I won't bore you with the power upsets we had during the night. Poor John was still awake and dressed well past midnight (2 am in fact) to accommodate 2 Scottish Power engineers who fixed a loose connection on the electricity pole replaced back in July. Ever since then our lights have been flickering but despite reporting it to inspectors nothing had happened. Last night the flickering became non stop and we called out an emergency engineer who discovered that a fault had been made installing the connections and had we not called them out last night the entire pole would probably have gone up in flames. Between the pole being erected and last night we have had engineers looking at it three times and all were told about the flickering! None took any action. Glad to know we are in safe hands with Scottish Power!!!

At least that has now been fixed and we're left with our ongoing telephone saga. Is it really possible to call out a British Telecom engineer and end up with a worse line than before. Yes, it is! More engineers will be arriving to work on the line tomorrow. Fortunately I will be doing lots of fun stuff with our visitor and will leave John in charge which I have to say is lucky for the engineers in question. I'm a much harder task master than he is. And far less polite!

And they talk about an idyllic life in the country.

 

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One Little Word Dream Book

I finished making this One Little Word Book today, following Kiala Givehand's instructions on YouTube here. She made it in a day. I need hardly add that it took me considerably longer! And not just because I had to wait for the right supplies such as large enough paper and the Hypotrochoid Art Set. You don't know what that means?? Me neither! But it turned out to be a reincarnation of the Spirograph. Remember those? Oh dear, that dates us terribly. In the process I also discovered a great fondness for Liquitex Glossy paint, which gives paper an amazing leather-like texture.

Kiala's video is free to view on YouTube and it is part of her monthly book making series of videos where all the books are made in just one day. She did the same thing in 2013 too but then the books were made weekly. but also in one day. All free so if you're interested search them out on her YouTube channel. There are some amazing book structures to be found in the various videos. 

She called this particular one, the first in 2014, One Little Word. Some of you will be familiar with the concept of adopting one little word as your Word of the Year. Kiala choose the word Breathe for her book. I'm not doing the One Little Word project but for my book I arrived without much thinking at the word Dream so used that for my book as you can see below. 

This is the entire book opened out and below are the individual pages whereas at the top is the closed version with closure. No more instructions from me here as this is Kiala's project. But I have to say that playing with that Hypotrochoid Set proved immensely addictive!