Fast and Easy Mini Books How-to

 Isn´t it really weird that when you finally feel like you are doing fine and things are well... something bad happens and everything gets effed up again? Thinking about it, it´s not totally unexpected things, but you still get caught by surprise, I mean, you could expect older folks to have health troubles, and you can´t expect 15+ years old pets to live forever...

Anyway, no one cares about whining, right? I´ve been making mini books again and today I´ll show you how to make a very simple opening dollhouse book with decorative corset binding. Actually, if you add a jewellery eyelet and use extra layer of varnish for protection, you can use it as a charm or necklace.

The nicest thing about this is that you can use whatever scraps of card and paper you find around the house. I won´t give you any dimensions, just go with whatever you feel like a good size. Anything from 15x20mm to 35x40mm works just fine.
You´re going to need: a piece of card or just heavier paper for the covers, strip of light weight paper for the pages inside, paints/stickers/scrapbook paper to decorate the covers, piece of embroidery thread, bigger sewing needle and any kind of white glue.
Start by cutting two covers of the same size, use the needle to poke holes through one side of both pieces. You need odd number of holes - this is important. Be careful! Blood stains don´t look nice on the book covers, unless you´re making umm... vampire´s diary. Cut a long strip of lightweight paper a bit narrower than the covers and fold it like accordeon. You can glue the insides of the "pages" together, but it works just as fine if you don´t.

First, prepare the covers. Draw, write, paint, cover them in paper or cloth, anything - just dont forget to poke the holes through again if you used a second layer of anything. Next, bind the book. Using this diagram will help you avoid any unsightly horizontal threads in this pretty corset-like binding:

The dashed lines of course go along the inner sides of the covers. Tie the lose ends at the bottom of the book together. I added a tiny piece of amethyst on the violet book dor decoration. Don´t forget to glue two pieces of thread or ribbon the the inner covers so you can tie the book closed. The finished cover:

Now you just need to glue the finished accordion paper strip inside the covers. Check if it lies flat when opened. There you go, you just made a mini book!

If you´d rather avoid the hassle, these (and other) books are/will be available in my shop, together with more wee witchy stuff. Have a sweet day!