In true Junk Journal fashion…

…I made use of some junk on my desk to add a journaling spot. I had printed out a couple of the quotes I thought I might use for that art journal page yesterday and one of them was just sitting there on my desk waiting to be utilized. I just inked the plain cream cardstock a bit to make it look more interesting

then added a bit of dyed lined paper and a stamped image from a Rubbermoon set that I don’t use enough

and stuck it down as a fold-over spot. I added the half-circle on the edge to catch and hold the fold-over closed so it doesn’t flap open every time I open the journal

and add my journaling for the day – private thoughts, as with most days. I need to be better about hiding the words and not depending on my crap handwriting to do it for me LOL!

I have to say, since the 100 days project I feel like I have done a better job of the recording-my-thoughts journaling than I ever have before. I do tend to focus on a few topics, and my thoughts are not always deep and meaningful, but I am finding the process useful and interesting to look back on, even a few months ago.

Another funny thing is I am looking forward to turning the page – the next spread has the little tea-bag pouches and some of the WOYWW swap stuff on it and I am keep to work on them. The page itself is a bit of a hot mess, with no cohesion, again, in true junk journal fashion, nothing pretty about it. But I am still looking forward to it. Why?

My junk journal is in use- yay!

I just decided to take the plunge and start using it. My plan is for it to be a sort of daily diary, with thoughts and maybe arty bits, just junk THOUGHTS as well as materials. I did finished the back cover, hinted at last week

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The words go together – Time flies…except when it doesn’t. Pretty much sums up the 18+ months of pandemic life and when you are immune-compromised, maybe more. The idea is to note the date with my date stamp, wherever I may write on the add-ins or on the actual page, not worrying too much about where the text may fall. The first bit of writing is on one of the fold-out tags:

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As you can see (maybe) I found the lovely little envelope of goodies from Caro, a WOYWW desk-hopper, and added on thereon the left. It’s very pretty and I have added a few of them to pages that needed a little somethin’-somethin’.

I also wanted to share a video I saw that was a super cute idea, a little folded belt that you can use as a closure for a mini-book or journal or whatever. I folded a couple of these and even without the grid she makes they are not hard. Because the wrap-around part can be cinched or expanded, it would be a good closure for a junk journal that you expect to grow. Have a look!

I could do photos, but really, this tutorial is so good, why? I do have an idea I want to try that…expands on this I guess. I’ll share it if it works LOL!

WOYWW Junk Journal Additions

Oh dear. I fear I might have forgotten all the correct people who sent what, but I am going to do my best! I got a LOT of stuff from Spyder. The ATC folder was actually cut in half, and each side filled with a little multi-coloured notepad made up of hand-dyed papers. The little top stapled holder was part of her envelope!

There was a belly-band around the holder, and that became a belly-band on another page, with the little journalingg cards created from another bit of the envelope:

The back of both cards again, lined with hand-dyed paper. This is some of the ones dyed with Dylusions spray ink! And that envelope was not yet done. The last bit made a pocke to hold more journaling cards:

Honestly, I think I used every scrap of that envelope except the tiny bit I punched out here and that bit was slightly ripped so it was fine to toss it in the bin. Lastly, I had the ATC holder from Susan Renshaw. It was so cute, and made a perfect pocket just as it was, although I added a punched circle (and promptly broke my punch, no idea how, and made the little folded journaling stripto fit inside from a scrap of card on my desk and yet more hand-dyed paper.

In the end I regretted chopping up Julia’s card so I opted not the use the lovely postcards from bothe Spyder and Sue. Maybe I’ll scan the writing and keep that then use the cards. Finally, eye test for me today and my daughter on Thursday, WOYWW tomorrow, and my knitting friends are popping round for a session in the garden, if the weather holds… Busy week!

Tea bag puches in my junk journal

Oops. Sorry about the typo. POUCHES. If I change it I think it will mess up the permalink to the post so Imma gonna leave it. Oh the shame of it….

I have been beavering away on that junk journal and am very nearly to the point where I can make the covers. Almost all pages have an addition of some spot for journaling added to them and I have used most of the bits from the WOYWW swap – at least the ones I can find. I know Caro sent me some bit and I know I tucked them away in a “safe place” (HA!) and will add them as soon as I remember where that is. But I had to make some tea for The Hubster yesterday and he had bought some tea with colourful packaging, so I decided to make use of it.

I needed to keep the box intact (mostly) as there are still many tea bags stored in it, but I felt the lid coud come off now. Not too complex at all. I cut down the tea bag pouches:

I wasn’t sure if I should cover the writing, but for now, I left it. I do have a die that MIGHT pretty much fit the spot but I don’t mind seeing the “junk” aspect of the things I am adding. I seem to have missed out a photo of adding hand-dyed paper with lines to the back of each half of the lid (cut to fit inside the pouches) and adding the ea bag labels as a pull to the top, but here they are in place in the journal:

I think they are pretty cute! I will probably do a quick re-cap of all the other WOYWW swap mailings that I used tomorrow, so the people who pop round on Wednesday can see them. Finding interesting ways to use as much of the stuff as I can was a fun process!

Junk Journal bits and where I am now

I magaged to use up the lovely envelope from Zsuzsa and the ATC swap, including the back of Julia’s card as a pull out journaling card. I love it. I had to fiddle a bit to get it the right size, in the right orientation, but I got there in the end:

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I also took a pretty glimmer-misted bit of vellum that had been run thru an embossing folder from YEARS ago – it was from an old Scrapbook Inspirations magazine article sample, that is how old it is – and made another simple flip up with some hand dyed paper under it for journaling.

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Couldn’t be simpler, really but I do like it a lot. I am at the point where I am looking at the lessons learned from my 100 Days project and the wedge-shaped first book. I have tried to alternate the inclusions on both sides of the accordion so there is no one area that is filled with thick pieces on every surface. I am marking where I know I need to add something to try to keep track!

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So far, it seems pretty OK – not too thick but satisfyingly chunky IYKWIM. I am working on a card, that I think will fall OUTSIDE my A Card A Day project, that I will share after WOYWW. It’s really quite a nifty design, although not mine. It satisfies the conditions for my ACAD challenge to myself, but it needs more than just a shot of the finished card, so I am opting to treat it more like a normal blog post. I can see me making a ton of these – so cute and not hard at all! WOYWW tomorrow! Yippee!

Junk Journal progress – and an odd addition from packaging

I am still beavering away behind the scenes, working on that l o n g accordion junk journal. I am always on the look-out for interesting inclusions and this week I got a really fun one. I ordered a few things from Paperchase, including the CUTEST Father’s Day card for my Hubby.

Frankly, I do have a shish kebab stamp and if I could have worked out an easy way to do the 3D waffle effect of the grill I might have tried to make it, but time was short. Anyway, the packaging was brown paper that was unlike any I have seen. I like it a LOT better than miles of bubble wrap, if I’m honest. The interesting part was that it tore off into perfectly sized little squares, albeit wrinkly ones:

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And from there it was easy to stamp some journaling lines on the bits and create a little note pad to slip inside a small envelope as the journaling spot on a page!

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I also made a little flip-flop-flappy thing from a magazine advert with a cool image and a ink+embossing folder sample and one from an old Wagamama menu.

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At some point I will finish this and be ready to actually work in it. Where it goes when I get to that point, I don’t quite know yet. I’m just enjoying the process!

ATC swap debris transformed for my Junk Journal

Oh I did have fun with this! First, Robyn’s envelope, which was far too lovely to put in the shredder:

Some of the hand-dyed papers and a bit of repair work

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I wasn’t super careful when I tore it open, my bad, but I salvaged it by lining the inside with some of the hand-dyed paper (stupidly using some of my lined versions. DOH! Plain would have done for this for sure) and reinforcing some other bits. Julia’s card was so adorable I had to figure out a way to add it

I used some of the back of Julia’s card over the torn edge and used the card itself slightly cut down and backed with lined paper to make a journaling spot. I needed it to fit Robyn’s envelope or I would have used it in it’s entirety:

I stuck the envelope just on the sides at the back so I could slip in the post card as a journaling spot too – although it is slightly vintage, I think it will be OK. SO MUCH of the junk journal stuff has a real vintage slant to it and that is very much NOT the vibe I am going for.

I really need to look at a few hidden paper clip ideas – I’ve seen them mentioned and have some ideas, but I feel like watching a tutorial might help me avoid making a mistake and using up a resource I may only have a tiny bit of. Not sure if that will appear tomorrow or if I will carry on and do something with Zsuzsa’s envelope. It will depend on how much time my ACAD card takes, I think.

No rest for the wicked….

WOYWW 628 – my Junk Journal progress, kinda

Happy WOYWW everyone! My desk, yesterday, was in a shocking state. I always snap a Tuesday afternoon shot so when I get my desk ready for WOYWW you can see that no, I am not a tidy crafter LOL!

This is all the junk journal stuff I dragged out to play with. The most critical task was to do what I did for the 100 Days project and organize things so I could minimize the hunting. It didn’t take as long as I thought it might. Ta Dah!

I actually set aside a few of the things on the left as I think they will work perfectly for the hard cover I plan to make for the accordion folded journal- so cute!

I have a plan to use some of the stuff that came with my swap ATCs and turn them into bits for my journal. I already know EXACTLY what I want to do with Julia’s card and Zsuzsa’s envelope, and I think Robyn’s envelope is going to come in to play as well – I should be able to share that tomorrow. I am also going hoping that other sentiment die is finally going to actually arrive this week. It is meandering at a snail’s pace towards the house. Cardmakers will want to look back a couple of posts or be satisfied with a sneaky peek at my play, creating a template for printing sentiments to fit the die I already have:

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And just cause I think it is super cute, I’ll add a card from my A Card A Day challenge to myself:

My favourite so far!

Happy WOYWW – busy week. An old scrapbooking buddy dropped by on Monday, knitting mates yesterday, who knows who else might meander by? Oh and my Man Bites Dog headline:

I feel like I need to be clear, there is an implied ex- in front of 1st Lady, lest the lovely Dr. Biden spring to mind.

Junk Journal progress – Menko pocket and more

Well. I had loads of fun dyeing papers. For most colours, I did a couple of sheets of grid paper, a couple of lined sheets and then five or so plain sheets. Already I can tell I really need many more of the lined and grid sheets, for backing journaling cards, etc. I backed some tags to insert into the Menko card pocket

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but clearly those few sheets are not going to last long. Luckily, I discovered that as long as I iron or press the dyed papers well, I can manually feed them thru my printer and add lines or grids easily. The colour is whack in the photo, but they muddy looking one is actually a purple on pale lavender dyed paper.

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I might give a pale grey a go next time, so the lines blend in a bit more, although I do like them high-contrast too. I love the aqua-on-lime a lot.

I’ve dragged out a lot of stuff, some from the collage fodder bin, some from the scrapbook-embellishment boxes, some from my arty-samples drawers. Just LOTS of colourful stuff.

I keep finding little gems in there. Those cardstock folders were so cute, I decided to use the pieces as templates and cut my own

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A couple of samples where I was playing around with a mix of matt medium, Pearl-ex, and some inks to make a mix I could then stamp with got turned into long journaling spots – backed with lined paper again, so yeah, I am burning thru it like mad!

Those bits became a cute pocket on one of the pages

That little saintly monkey has been in my collage stash for AGES. Glad to finally use him!

More JJ tomorrow, and with a WOYWW twist!

Paper dyeing for Junk Journals

I shared my no-sew junk journal, made from scraps, yesterday, but another project I have been working on is dyeing some paper for another, more traditional sewn signature junk journal. My plan is for this to have a combo of dyed papers and scrapbook papers. The dyeing part wass mostly prompted by finding this little stash of dyes (how old are THEY?) saved complete with the actual instructions.

They actually work almost too well! Really, it needs only a brief dip into the dye they laying out to dry to get pretty vibrant colours. And I am able to save the leftovers to either dilute and dye more paper in a paler hue or combine.

I have been using the wrong sort of container for the dipping, I think.

It works OK, but really slightly too small for A4 paper. I had The Hubster check out Costco for large, flat food prep tins over the weekend but no luck. I have another idea, a spare broiler pan from a long-ago oven, but it is dark, so hard to see into. I have a few ideas to expand this, maybe using some of the things I use to dye yarn (KoolAid, Wiltons cake frosting dyes, etc) like I used for these skeins of sock yarn

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I am most interested to see if the black will break like it does in the crockpot. As it will never need to be washed, paper dyeing might actually be easier that yarn dyeing – the colourfastness won’t be so much of an issue. What is an issue is the weather! I can only dye one colour at a time and only about 6-8 sheets, due to drying space in my craft room. If I had done this on a sunny day (not always a given in the UK, even in the summer!) then I could have dyed all of the colours and left them drying on various outside tables. Ah well….. I still have Blue Reef, Coral and Hibiscus left, then if I want, various combos. I’d like to get a purple, and there are at least two other things I want to see if I can dye. Then, having created MORE paper, I will have to use it! Oh dear.