Saturday afternoon book making

Tuesday night is a big evening for me.  Our local Community College is hosting an event where they are bringing in an author and letting him speak then sign autographs.  West Kentucky Community Technical College has done this before, but this is the first time I have longed to go.  It was almost a year ago that I read about the event and have counted down the days.

Who is coming to the little town of Paducah?  Why Jamie Ford.  You haven't heard of him?  Well, you need to google it right now.  Purchase the Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet first and you will be hooked.  There is a second novel entitled Songs of Willow Frost that I also recommend.

I discovered Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet not long after it was published.  I read it, reread it....well, I keep rereading it.  I have the ebook, but once I found out Jamie was coming to Paducah, I bought a paper copy as well.  I pre-purchased Songs of Willow Frost from BAM! and it was delivered to my house the day the book was released.  If you pre-purchased Songs, Jamie would email you a little "supplement" type/companion book written about one of the characters in Hotel on the Corner of Bitter and Sweet.  I read it when he emailed me, but decided that since I was going to meet him next week I would try to see if he would autograph my ebook too.

I printed the book in full form. It was rather large to bind, so I printed as a booklet.






I took a large sheet of mat board and cut me a couple of covers (8.5x6).  I covered each cover with one 12x12 scrapbook page (Bohemia by My Mind's Eye---the best paper pad EVER!!!).








 In the meantime I put together the booklet, scored the middle, and sewed the binding of the pages.  Once that was finished I inked the pages with Distress Ink by Tim Holtz (old paper and walnut stain).  I hot glued a ribbon to the "spine" of the booklet (gluing the booklet in the exact center of the ribbon).  Once the hot glue set up, I put a strip of hot glue on the inside edge of one of the covers and put the ribbon down on that side.  Once set I repeated the process with the other side of the ribbon and other cover.  The thickness of the book looks nice between the covers.  I mod podged the covers after adding some walnut stain ink to the edges.  I also mod podged the overleafs of the booklet to each cover giving it a finished look.

On the cover, I used Jamie's cover, but I ran out of color ink. I will reprint before Tuesday and mod podge the new photo onto the cover.

Not perfect but it's kind of like me...covered in flaws but handy.