Steampunk Leather Longstitch Journal and Handmade Abaca Paper

Hello everyone! Remember this picture from the last post?

Well, at long last, here's a closer look at the book on the bottom. It's a leather journal bound with longstitch, and I hope it gives off a somewhat steampunk vibe:







Now I just need to fill it, I suppose...
And here's a preview for a project I'll be working on this week. All of this is handmade abaca paper, and the pulp for each one was beaten for a different amount of time. The little tag on the top that says "7" means that I beat that stack's pulp for seven hours. If you're curious, the different time periods were, in hours, 1.5, 2, 2.5, 3, 2.5, 4, 5, 6, and 7. This week I'm going to work on binding them into a book!

Creation Myth Installation and Hand-bound Books!

Happy weekend, everyone! I, for one, am taking a nice cushy weekend, as all week I've been working on this, an installation piece about the creation of a world. The pattern on the head and all the little individual parts are screenprinted, and the pieces were laboriously hand-cut-out by not only me but my amazing friends as well, who spent hours of their time to help me get this done. So Lauren, Beth, Megan, Naeha, Patrick, Jase, Stone (who also took these photos), and Collin, thanks from the bottom of my heart, you guys rock, and I couldn't have done it without you!

Other than that, I've also made a few books recently. From top to bottom, there's an accordion book, a coptic stitch book, and a leather longstitch book that isn't finished yet. I'll most likely complete it today and update later:

Here's the first one, an accordion book called "a tale of suspense followed by disappointment." The paper I used is paste paper I made, and the fish and boats are pen on mylar (a material I have quickly learned to love):





Here's the first page:



Many pages later:



The disappointing end:



And here's the second book in the pile, a coptic stitched book made with graph paper, tealish paper that I made awhile ago, and red/gold handmade paper that I bought:





Hopefully, I'll finish the leather one today and have it updated tonight or tomorrow!

Shrinky-Dink Goliath Beetle Necklace

Time for a weekend mini-update!

I liked drawing the goliath beetle that I printed on those lunch trays so much that I had to draw another one on shrinky-dink paper to make my own goliath beetle necklace. If you look closely, you can see that there's a pin sticking about 1/4 of an inch out between the thorax and abdomen, so it looks a bit like the beetle is pinned to my chest when I'm wearing it. How delightfully entomological!