Tag Book

Hello again friends....

Today I am sharing a book I made for my grandson Layton to give his mummy for Mother's Day!

Have to say it was well received so I was pleased I spent so long planning and making it...

Can you believe this book is made from 5 empty toilet rolls and 5 sheets of 6x6 papers? Well it is...

To start you need to completely flatten the empty loo rolls and the best way to do that is steam press with an iron – yes that's right – iron the loo rolls – here is the proof – I don't iron so Pete couldn't resist capturing me when I did this!!!!

Once they are done its a case of adding double sided tape ensuring the left edge has no tape – flip the roll and add tape again to the roll leaving the same left side with no tape.

Take your chosen paper, line the edge of the paper to the left edge with no tape – then fold up the bottom of the paper, add another strip of DST over the folded paper, then fold the right hand side of paper across the back of the loo roll – it will cover and over hang by a fraction which you then cut off. The paper will be around 1cm above the roll so cut the corners then fold into the roll – one page done!!

Simply do this on all 5 rolls, make your hinges by cutting a strip of card approx 6cm wide and 20cm long, use the blue Eazi Score Board, line the left edge to line 3 and then score lines

5 & 6 spin the strip and again line up on line 3 and score on lines 5 & 6. Fold in half width ways and cut – you now have 2 pieces – cut both long ways – you will have 4 pieces – each with 2 score lines. Simply slot one edge into the covered roll where you had no tape and the other edge into the next loo roll...do this so all rolls are attached!

Next you need your cover so chose paper or card to match, cover the book leaving as much space as you wish on the top and bottom then stick in place – you may wish to punch the edges before sticking.

I used papers from my Forever Friends everyday pad – and for my spine cover I used some beautiful black patterned card. I added 2012 and MUM to the cover! Remember to add your ribbon before you add the spine!

I used the Do Crafts Digital Designer cd, chose the me to you bears I wanted and resized so they would fit the pages....I also added some sentiments, tags, toppers, banners etc to the sheets I was creating then printed them onto matt photo paper.

I cut out all the tatty teddies then decided which was going where....they were all stuck in place using Cosmic Shimmer Clear PVA glue – I added some borders to some of the pages!

Once I had the pages sorted I cut 6 pieces of card slighter bigger than the loo rolls, used the corner chomper to round all the corners then punched a hole through the top centre with the crop-o-dile and added lilac flower shaped eyelets.

To decorate the tags and make it personal I printed out lots of photographs of Layton and some were cut, some punched, some torn – then all added to the tags...along with a sentiment of some kind...

One tag was made to stand alone as the book had its 5 in place already – this last tag had some lovely mother's day verses added as well as a message for mum..

To finish this keepsake I added flat back pearls and gems to the pages and deep purple spotty ribbon to all the tags which matched the ribbon used to tie the book up.

Layton's mum loved the book and said it will be added to the family memory box in time....

Here are all the photo's - be warned - there are loads!!!

I do hope you like this project – its easy to do – and I have written a step by step with photographs to help – so if you would like a copy please get it touch...

Thanks for looking....till tomorrow then...x