Book binding

     This isn't the first time I've done notebooks from scratch, but it has been a long time since I did any craft involving paper and since I've learned a few things while doing this, I decided to share. Last month I came across a bunch of paper bags (the big, brown ones used in grocery stores) and decided to recycle them into a notebook:

     The pages were made from the bags as well as the paper for the covers and spine.  I used cardboard from cereal boxes for the (not so hard) covers and lined them with more paper bags.

     It's been a long time since I've made one of those, so I checked Pinterest for tutorials on binding.  I mixed and matched different techniques to sew the signatures together and then used gauze (yep, the stuff used for wounds) to glue to the spine.

     I then cut the card board to size (kinda) and worked on the final look of the cover.  For the lining, I crumpled another piece of the bag (where the logo was) a few times, until the paper felt like fabric.  I then smoothed it out a bit with my hands and rubbed a stamp pad over it.
     It ended up being too dark for my liking, so I painted it over with some crackle paint I had laying around.

What I've learned:

     It took me forever to cut the bag into pages and making the holes to sew them together.  Next time, I'll make a template for both the pages and to figure out where the holes should go.
     Joel likes the fancy kind of cereal (you know the ones with whole grains and whatnot?) and those come in boxes made out of recycled material.  Meaning the cardboard is less sturdy than it needs to be to make a decent hard cover.  Next time I'll glue two pieces together for each cover.
     I need to be more patient.  Gluing more stuff before the stuff you glued prior is dry isn't a good idea - as seen here:

   
     This is a photo of the second notebook I've made (because it was fun!).  This one has pages done out of what we think is rice paper that isn't good for folding.  The lining on the covers is made from crumpled gold tissue paper.

     You can see that the covers are warping a bit, that is due to the thickness (or better, the lack thereof) of the cardboard I used.