Books, Books, Books...

I've always been obsessed with books, especially sketchbooks, art journals, and scrapbooks, but lately, it seems my obsession has kicked into high gear!  I can't go a day without spending at least an hour inside the covers of one of these books...  I've been working on filling several art journals and sketchbooks, and I've also been working on my Project Life albums and Smash Books lately too.  Oh, and I just finished a little Snap! album for 2013.  I hope to share more pages from these books, maybe in video form or just in a photo heavy post, but for now, here are a few little peeks...

The page below is from the little handmade book that you see in the above stack of books (it's the top book with the ribbon binding).  The book pages were put together from scraps I sewed together on my sewing machine, and the stitching was inspired by the work of Thomas Campbell, who I have been obsessed with for quite some time now!  The left part of the page has a scrap from a vintage grade book (flea market find) and a halftone made from a vintage photo booth picture (also a flea market find).  On the right, I was working on practicing brush script, and the paint was still wet when I took the photo - I like how it still glistens! :)

Next up is a page from the same book, where I did some random sketching, wrote a favorite quote, and added some white triangle designs that I made from some old puffy wallpaper border.  The background is from an old oil monoprint that I made in college.  This was a fun page to make!

The last page below is from a different handmade book (not one from the stack at the top of the post), and it was made with old xeroxes from t-shirt designs, masking tape, markers, watercolor, acrylic paint, and some craft sprays.  I love the randomness of these books that begin with binding papers together that already have images on them before the books is bound...  Making books this way also eliminates the "fear of the blank page," and it sets up challenges for myself when I start to fill the book.  I love working this way!

I hope you are having a creative week!  Thanks for taking a look inside my books today.