A Shabby Journal for Artfest

Here is a completed example of a Remains of the Day/ Shabby Journal that I put together after taking a Mary Ann Moss on-line class. It is a gift to my daughter and intended to travel to Artfest with her in about a week.

Mary Ann describes her class as being both process and project oriented. She shows you how to construct a shabby but sturdy book structure using all that paper you've been hoarding. She loves options, and with this journal there are plenty! Use it for your next:
Travel Journal
or
Weekly or Monthly Diary
or
Ultra Funkified Day Planner
or
Visual Journal without paint

You can find Mary Ann Moss here:

http://dispatchfromla.typepad.com/dispatch_from_la/


Here is a close-up of the grand button that is part of the closure.

Pages in this journal alternate between heavily decorated scrap paper patchwork collage and calmer, less decorated areas that can be written upon. I doodle with pen, markers and the sewing machine stitch line. Threads are deliberately left hanging in several places.

The focus is a little off in the photograph above, but it illustrates a unique closure. A piece of Kleenex box is attached to an envelope flap and then slit so that it sits around a vertical strip of heavy printed paper. The envelope is functional for enclosing paper and other small items.

It is a made up concept that guys in Easter Bunny costumes are just so French, but as editor of the shabby journal, these are decisions you can make. This is a page from a magazine gathered during a trip that I took to visit the daughter when she was in France.

As someone that routinely constructs scrap based postcards, I have an excuse for the hoarding all manner of paper bits and images. Now, they have yet another place to go live.

Here you can see the journal laid open. There are a variety of pocket structures, both paper and fabric, vertical and horizontal. The fabric interior of the journal has a bold black and white striped pattern.

Another open spread is pictured here.

Think of this as a perfect place to deposit your deep thoughts, shallow thoughts, and everything in between. As it is so scrappy and free form, this journal presents less of the intimidation that blank pages sometimes create. You are free to start adding to it on any given page.

The idea is to tuck in purchased postcards as you write them to yourself and various bits of paper ephemera from the trip. For example one could do a mini review of a restaurant meal on the back of the guest check or just describe the cute waiter and tuck that in somewhere.

I used a fair amount of paper bits from previous travels in the Pacific Northwest for the construction this journal.

This tight close-up of the page above is one of my favorite images from the quickie photo shoot before popping this journal in the mail this morning.

Carina