A Mixed Media Notebook

April 3rd 2014

I love my iPhone but there are times when I need to write things down properly, on paper.  In my purse I always carry a small Moleskine notebook.  It gets pretty battered in there with all the other stuff but it I use it all the time.  I tape in paint color chips for when I'm in the middle of a decorating project and need the wall color to get towels, bedding or accessories.  I make notes of sizes of a mirror I need for a particular spot.  Sometimes I just doodle or draw pincushion ideas while I'm waiting to pick up my daughter from school.  My first such notebook was given to me by a good friend who hand printed a design on the cover and wrote a message on the first page.  As soon as I held it in my hands, I was hooked!  

I thought I'd share the way I put together the layered Moleskine notebooks I have in my shop.  I love to scrapbook and I really enjoy playing with the process of layering paper to enhance my photos.  Over the years I've learned a lot about scrapbooking techniques from blogs and websites especially http://www.twopeasinabucket.com.  They have a great library of videos on their website about design and technique and, of course, I can also shop for the latest, greatest scrappy goodness.  Here is a layout that uses lots of layers of papers.  I often ink the edges of my papers to give definition and the papers are selected for color and because they go with the theme of the page. 

                                      

When making my notebooks, I use the same techniques.  I begin with an idea for the theme of the notebook, in this case a journal appropriate for a teen girl.  I pull out papers that coordinate from a variety of paper collections.  It doesn't matter if the papers come from different manufacturers as long as the colors tone.  For this project I picked black and white, pink, grey and blue/green.  They are all acid free, quality scrapbooking papers.

Here I have collected the papers, little embellishments, the notebook and my tools.  The embellishments are picked for their color and because their style fits this particular project.  Now comes the fun part, lots of cutting and arranging of layers till I find a combination that works.  I start with the bigger pieces and then add the smaller layers, tucking little things here and there.  At this point I would normally ink all the edges of the paper pieces but I wanted this notebook to be really simple and clean to appeal to a teen.  

 

Nothing is glued down yet so I can move things around till I'm satisfied.  When I'm happy with it, I move everything off the notebook and begin to glue down layers.  Usually things get changed a bit as I go.

This is the finished journal.  It's easy to get frustrated with our teens!  I like the reminder that they need unconditional love as much as our younger children.