the hybrid chick

When I saw these beautiful Doodle Stamps at The Digichick, they reminded me of some of my favorite verses from the book of Hebrews, so I decided to make a little inspirational album, using the doodled words on one side of the page, and the corresponding verses on the other page. The classic colors and beautiful patterns in Kelly Mickus’s Our Story kit seemed to fit the theme perfectly. I decided to make each page 4 inches square so that I would be able to fit four on each page I printed. After I scrapped each page digitally, I flattened it and opened up a new standard size canvas and arranged the pages so that they would fit inside my printer margins.  After I finished, I printed them all out and gathered the rest of the supplies that I knew I’d need to complete the project.

Digital Supplies:
Our Story by Kelly Mickus
Doodle Stamps Part 2 by TKWhimsy
TK Smiley Font by TKWhimsy
TK Turtle Soup Font by TKWhimsy

Physical Supplies:
Bazzil cardstock
brown paper lunch bags
decorative edge scissors
plus the basics: ruler, craft knife, adhesive
You could also add whatever other types of embellishments you wanted (ribbons, buttons, flowers, etc.).

I cut out all my pages and matted them with the brown cardstock for extra stability.

Then I trimmed the bottoms off of the brown paper bags and cut the end with my decorative scissors to mimic the look of the top so that when I folded the bag in half, the pages would look similar. I repeated the process with three other bags, folding each in half. I was thinking about hole punching the fold on each one and tying them all together with ribbons, but I decided instead to pull out my old nemesis, the sewing machine, and give that a try. In the end, I triumphed, and the bags were all stitched together. The needle wouldn’t go through all the layers at once initially, so I sewed the bags together in sets of two, and then sewed the whole group together.

After I got the base of the album finished, all that remained was gluing in my pages and embellishing with whatever physical goodies I had on hand. I added a fun scrunched-up ribbon that I found in the dollar bin at Michaels over the weekend to cover my sewing seams. Inside the pockets created by the open ends of the lunch sacks, I am planning to put little notes or keepsakes that pertain to each of the pages. Except for my inefficiency with the sewing machine, the album came together quickly and I think I may make a few more copies to have on hand for hostess or thank you gifts. I hope this little project inspires you to create your own memory or inspirational books, either for your own enjoyment or for the benefit of your friends and family!

Other Articles by Jessica Pranaitis:

• Gallery Finds - March 10th, 2010
• Chinese Takeout Container - February 3rd, 2010
• Stocking Stuffer Gift Tin - December 23rd, 2009
• Thanksgiving Tree - November 6th, 2009
• Stamping Digitally - October 11th, 2009