enJOY it by Elise Blaha Cripe

weekend links / 55.

I love the Internet. Here's some of the cool stuff I saw this week...

great list of apps to check out.

I'm obsessed with the patterns Justina's been creating lately. Here's how she does it.

8 energy-cleansing tips.

cool tee.

ahhhh, Tara, you inspire.

"No one is doing it all, and we are all "lazy" in some way." - holler.

uh oh. Still excited to watch though.

great quote.

honored to be included on this list of creative podcasts.

february : currently.

wearing a new short haircut. New decade, new hair style.

enjoying MAKE&GIVE30 so much and the projects that are coming from it so far. (follow me on instagram for so many peeks at #makeandgive30)

appreciating your kind comments this week!

reading One Plus One.

eating this salad every other night. It's tough to rave about a salad this one is so. good. Try it and see if you agree.

watching Parenthood while weaving.

fangirling over the Parks & Rec finale. Finales are tough. I thought they did it well. April's zombie make-up was my favorite scene x100.

dropping off another roll of film.

waiting not so patiently for Get To Work Book™ samples! An update on this adventure coming soon.

planting veggies in our garden to take advantage of the rainstorms we are supposed to get. I realize that much of the country is experiencing a very harsh winter. I'm thinking all the warm, safe thoughts and hoping a beautiful spring comes soon for you.

thinking I have finally found the hat to rule all hats.

loving this 20 month toddler stage. Ellerie is learning all the words and making me laugh all the time. She's picked up a "fake chuckle" that always turns into a real giggle for both of us.

doing my best to imprint these moments onto my brain.

cutting way, way back on my email time and feeling more like a person and less like a robot #winwin.

looking so forward to a weekend in Vegas with Paul and some friends and then a full week at home for family. When Paul requested the first week of March off last summer it felt years away. And now we're here! Good foresight, Paul.

announcing the random winner of the hand-bound book at the bottom of the original post. Thanks for your comments!

huge photobooth style family photos.

I've had this idea in my head for way too long and I'm so excited to share it with you today in partnership with Canon USA.

I am a huge fan of photo booth strips and we have tons displayed in our house. Most are either on the fridge, on my bulletin board or matted on white cardstock and framed (like this).

I wanted to do something different though and create a "photobooth strip" out of full size photos to fill a narrow wall in our hallway. I figured the perfect frames would just be simple white. (I picked four up at Target.)

To get the photos, I taped my iPhone to a wall (using masking tape) that was opposite another white wall in our house. I then practiced and made sure the forward facing camera worked before gathering up Paul and Ellerie.

Sidenote: I think this process would also be awesome if you already have a photo booth strip that you love and just want to emphasize by making it huge. You could just scan it and print each photo separately to frame. My friend, veronica, got engaged in a photobooth and v - you NEED to do this with that photo strip.

I used the 3 sec timer on the iPhone to take five photos (all on burst mode). This took 15 seconds total which is great because that is about the range of Ellerie's attention span these days.

Then I went through the burst photos and selected my four favorite images. I used VSCOcam app to boost the contrast a bit and convert to black and white. On my computer, I blew them up to 8x10. Because of the forward facing camera, they were a bit smaller and lower quality than normal iPhone photos. Up close they are a touch pixelated. This doesn't bother me in the slightest.

I printed at home on my Canon PIXMA MG7520 on 8.5x11 matte photo paper.

Then I trimmed to 8x10 and framed them.

I hung them on the wall using command strips since I wanted them to hang one directly on top of each other. This was much easier than having to match up four nail holes perfectly. And it makes sure they are sturdy and really stuck when little fingers go to grab.

I love how this looks on the wall. It's been up for about a month and every time I walk by I grin. It would be fun to do one every year and then have a full grid of photos filling a much larger wall...

This post is brought to you by Canon USA. Project idea, words, opinions are all my own.

february book report

Here we go! 

I'll Give You the Sun by Jandy Nelson / I love going into books with no clue as to what I am going to get. This was one of those books. It's young adult (which I realize I read a lot of, but tends not to be my favorite) and a very quick read. I figured out one of the big plot points early, but it was still twisty and smart and surprising. Fun one.

Major Pettigrew's Last Stand by Helen Simonson / I didn't love this book, but it was all I had and so I kept reading. Usually I have to convince myself to put books down to turn off the light and fall asleep but this one put me to sleep after just a few pages each night. That's awful, but sadly true. I didn't end up finishing. Only 20 pages to go and I finally realized I could give up. In the past I haven't mentioned the books I don't get through, but I resolved this year I'd share it all. Plus, the reviews on amazon are good so I'm sure many will enjoy this.

The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion / I adored this. The main character was offbeat, charming and I loved the way he thought things through. It was laugh outloud funny and though not realistic somehow still so real. I looked forward to reading this one each night and wish it had taken longer to get through.

The Kings Curse by Phillipa Gregory / these historical novels are my guilty pleasure. I think I've almost read them all? And my only regret is that I didn't wait until they were all out and then read them in time order. I love reading basically the same story (Tudor England) as told from so many (strong female) perspectives. 

Me Before You by Jojo Moyes / so many folks had recommended this to me and I finally picked it up from the library. Oofta. All the feelings. It's a love story but it's also a "love life" story. And I (obviously) loved that. Highly recommend.

What are you reading?

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Today on ELISE GETS CRAFTY I'm chatting with the couple behind Pinch of Yum about transparency in business. Maybe my favorite topic! Subscribe on iTunes or stream here.

Other posts you might enjoy: 

• creative books I always return to
• 9 books our toddler loves
• winter book report 
• summer book report
• spring book report

 

PROJECT 1/30 : a handbound journal

Annnnnnnnd, we're off!

30 projects in 365 days? That sounds manageable. (I've got four queued and ready to roll.)

I mentioned that phase one of this project is all about using up existing supplies. This is part of my idea that sometimes creativity comes when you GET IN A BOX. Setting parameters and working with what you have can make you even more inspired. The example I like to use is the Project Runway one: the challenges when the designers had to "make it work" with car parts always had much more interesting results than when they could use any fabric at Mood.

I have had a case bound grid journal from Paper Source in my cupboard for years and knew it would have to be Project 1.

Hilariously, I have already attempted to do a tutorial of this process (and I've already given a handbound book away!) but every five years you get to recycle blog content so we're good. Plus, I've gotten moderately better at taking photos of myself doing projects in five years. Though if I do anything right in the next five years it will be hiring an assistant to help me take photos.

I didn't have any great patterned paper on hand for the cover of the book so I decided to really go for it and stamp my own with a hand-carved stamp I made a few years ago. I already had white bookcloth and kraft paper on hand so it was a no-brainer to use white paint.

I love the look that results from a hand-carved stamp. The imperfections really make it. (I you want to carve your own, this is a great kit, I love this brayer and I have had great results with this printing ink - though any craft paint works.)

The hardest part of this project is (sadly) sourcing the book kits. You need a text block and precut book board which isn't easy to find. Paper Source has these square ones in limited quantities. Blick has these smaller ones at a great price if you want to make a bunch (teacher gifts anyone?). I am sure there are more, but these are the only brands I have tried. Other than that, you'll want:

• PVA glue
• a glue brush
• pencil
• ruler
• book cloth
• bone folder
• scissors

STEP 1 : cut your book cloth down so it's a few inches taller than your book and about 4-5 inches wide. Fold it in half the long (hot-dog) way. You now know where the center of your spine will be. Place your ruler on the fold and measure out about the width of your text block on each side.

For this book, my text block is 10/16 inches thick. I went 9/16 out on either side of the 6 (see those marks on the ruler?) We measure out this far to be sure our book will open and close properly. Mark these spots with a pencil in two places of the book cloth.

STEP 2 : apply glue to the bookcloth starting at the pencil marks and pulling out all the way to the edge of the bookcloth. Line your bookboard up with the marks and push down to adhere.

STEP 3 : do the same on the other side, being careful to line the top of the two bookboard pieces up.

STEP 4 : apply glue to the top of the bookcloth and pull it tightly over the bookboard.

STEP 5 : use your bone folder to smooth out any wrinkles of the booktape on the back and front sizes. (At this point you can add a bit more bookcloth to the back center - see final photo in step 12 below - but it's not necessary.)

STEP 6 : congrats! You have just combined two pieces of bookboard (your covers!) with a spine!

STEP 7 : we are now going to cover the book with paper. The amount of paper you'll need will vary based on the size of your book. You will want 2 pieces (one for the front and one for the back) and you should shoot for a few inches taller and wider than what your final book will be. Apply glue to the backside of the paper, taking care to pull the brush off the edge (on to scrap paper). We need that whole edge covered with glue.

STEP 8 : turn the paper over and line up the glued edge against the spine so it covers the bookcloth edge but leaves about an inch of cloth showing. Use your bone folder to smooth things out.

STEP 9 : turn the book back over and use scissors, to cut wide U shapes out of the two corners, making sure to leave about 1/8 inch of space between the paper and the bookboard corner.

STEP 10 : apply glue and fold down the top and bottom sides of the paper.

STEP 11 : use your bone folder to tuck in the extra little bit corner - this will give the book a polished look.

STEP 12 : apply glue and fold over that final side. Pull tight and smooth out with the bone folder.

Repeat steps 7-12 for the other side. Congrats! Your cover is complete!

The final step is to drop in the text block. The text block is a "pre-glued set of pages" and it slips right into your covers. Stick yours in and be sure that it fits. To hold it in place, we need to cover the whole front and back pages with PVA glue. This part always makes me nervous.

What I like to do is get it lined up in the cover exactly how I like it. Then I carefully set it on the table and open the front cover. Slip a piece of scratch paper under the front piece of the text block and apply glue to the whole thing, pulling the brush over the edge of the page and on to the scrap paper. Without moving the text block, close the book and firmly press down the cover. Remove the scrap paper.

Then flip the book over and do the same to secure the last page of the text block to the back cover.

Tuck fresh scratch paper (without glue on it) behind the covers to protect the pages and stick it under a heavy book for a few hours. The extra scratch paper will absorb any extra moisture. This glue is no joke and your book will hold beautifully.

Hooray! A REAL BOOK. I've learned a lot of DIY tricks over the past decade but book binding is top ten for sure. When I make stuff, I am trying to make stuff that I would actually want to buy. This is one of those projects for sure and a perfect kick off to MAKE&GIVE30.

And now! The giveaway. Since this is a journal... leave a comment telling me something that you'd write down in it. Grocery lists? Dreams? Things your kids say? Funny Leslie Knope quotes? I'll draw a random winner by the end the week. Giveaway open to anyone, anywhere.

GIVEAWAY CLOSED! Random.org chose #278 as the winning comment which is Sara (Kanapi). Sara, please email me at elise.blahaATgmail.com and I'll send out your book. Thank you!