Sunshine & Raindrops: Treasury Features

This little address book that I made recently was kindly featured in two Etsy Treasuries.

The collection above was curated by a gal named Cassie who makes clever baby and bridal gifts.

This collection was curated by an Etsy seller named Katrina who sells really fabulous accessories.

What a pleasant surprise it is, to find out that people are stumbling upon my shop! I am in the midst of so many projects right now that it is easy to forget that there is life beyond the bindery walls! Some really neat projects have found their way to my work bench and I'll get to share some of them later this month.

It's a beautiful day in Orlando, I hope you're all enjoying this first week of October wherever you are! Perhaps your days are full of orange and blue?

Anniversary Book

This morning I spent about ten minutes watching a heart warming and tear jerking video of soldiers reuniting with their children. It made me want to put Return to Me in the dvd player, turn the air conditioning up, cuddle under a warm blanket and let the tears flow! However, it's only 9am and these books don't bind themselves, so instead I'm reminiscing about a book bound for a sweet and thoughtful wife to give to her husband on their 10th anniversary earlier this year.

My client wanted a small 5" x 5" blank book full of deckled edge watercolor pages. She provided the beautiful piece of fabric for the cover as well as some of the silk from her wedding dress for the doublures.

The blank pages were filled with a letter from wife to husband. It's an honor to make books like these that will end up being keepsakes for years to come.

Here's to a day full of sweet things and happy tears!

Manolo Valdés at Chambord

While at Chateau de Chambord in the Loire Valley, I had the opportunity to take in some sculpture work of Spanish artist, Manolo Valdés.

A variety of his work was in and around the chateau, but I was especially drawn to his wooden sculptures.

At first I thought we stumbled upon a room full of real books, but it turned out that Valdés' eye for the color and texture of wood made it possible for him to create the illusion of a furnished room. I suppose that works of art can be considered furniture, but I've described it as an illusion because none of the pieces are functional in the traditional sense of the objects that they visually describe.

I don't know if faux-furniture was the exact goal, but I found it fitting and poetic in this exorbitantly sized castle that was built more as a status symbol than a place to live and work.

These sculptural bookshelves probably get more handling than a shelf of real books would have gotten when kings passed through Chambord!

 Here is a shot of one side of the chateau. It was truly massive.

Black and White and Red all over!

I'm not talkin' newspapers! Nice thick business cards - white on one side, black on the other, with red printing and red edges. Pretty sharp. Printed by Mama's Sauce and edge colored by me, 500 down and a mere 1,250 to go!

Cleaning off all of the dark gray dust from the white sides, after sanding the edges smooth, really made me appreciate the last edges I colored (red on pure white cards).

It's official, I've been back home for two weeks, and I'm back in the swing of things. Josh and I are still updating our other blog because there are plenty of adventures that we still have to share. Last week I posted a summary of the people and places we got to see.

Congratulations Erin & Frank!

My friends, Erin and Frank, are getting married today!  I really wish that Josh and I could fly over from France for the weekend to celebrate with them. They came all the way from Florida to our Seattle wedding and we loved having them there. I know theirs will be a perfect and festive wedding! The couple and many of their good friends are avid swing dancers so there's sure to be lots of dancing. Also, the Scrabble theme as seen in the guest book will be present in other ways today, for example the place cards are letter trays with each of the guests' names spelled out! I can't wait to see all of the pictures. Speaking of pictures, here is a link to their lovely engagement photo session taken by Photonotions Photography.

It was a fun book to make. At first I tried to saw through the Scrabble pieces to make them thinner, but I soon realized that wasn't my most brilliant idea! To save my fingers I decided to work around the full thickness of the pieces. Above you can see my solution - the covers are made using two layers of laminated .98 board. The Kutrimmer couldn't quite handle that thickness, so I cut them by hand. Phew! It was a great workout!

Wounded Dove Pendant by Roxanna Bikadoroff

 photo courtesy of ABC
Josh and I have been big LOST fans since the beginning and we just finished the finale. Phew! It was hard to wait a whole day for it to become available to us in France, but somehow we made it through! I'm still reflecting on the series, so I'm not planning on discussing the show here... About halfway through the finale, as we somewhat patiently waited for the remaining minutes to buffer, I checked my email and got a fun surprise.

The surprise was an email from talented illustrator, Roxanna Bikadoroff. I first made contact with Roxanna after I was approached about creating some custom miniature book earrings using her cover illustration for Flannery O'Connor's Everything That Rises Must Converge. She kindly gave me permission to reproduce her covers for that purpose.

I can't speak to my client's interest, but much of the recent popularity of the book is due to the sight of it in Jacob's hands during the season five finale of LOST. Some fan I am, I missed it first time around but the Loophole LOST Forum called my attention to the matter after they somehow found an image of the earrings I made and posted about them.

So, back to that email...Last year, Roxanna had mentioned that she was working on getting silver pendants made based on the wounded dove of her cover design. Her work payed off and now there is a limited number of her lovely silver pendants available! So, whether you're a fan of LOST, Flannery O'Connor, Roxanna Bikadoroff, or all three, it's definitely worth a look! To learn more about the wounded dove or purchase your own pendant, visit her blog or Etsy shop. To see more great work, follow this link to visit Roxanna's website.

Inspired by Ironwork

This is a collection of ironwork balconies I couldn't resist photographing as our Les Cars Rouges open top tour of Paris sped by (hence all the funky angles!). According to my scholarly Wikipedia research, wrought ironwork was popular in France from the 1600s. I'm not sure, but since these were on buildings with many repeats of the same style of balcony, I'd guess that they are cast ironwork, which would have been popular around the 18th century.

I think I'll return to these images when it's time to get my gouges out and do some gold tooling. I saved the image at a rather large size, so you can click on it to see the details up close!

Bonjour Paris!


This long-stitch book is what I've brought along with me as my journal-sketchbook. I've just been carrying it around in my jacket pocket today! For a look at what is inside, feel free to visit Josh and my new blog: adventuringholtsclaws.blogspot.com.

The cover is quilted, using my go-to sturdy pink fabric (remainders from extremely long Ikea curtains that I hemmed), leftover batting, and binding with a print that I couldn't resist when I was last at the quilt shop.

I've already started using it and I'm crossing my fingers that I keep it up! I love the color combo, so I'm betting I'll keep it nice and close!