Congratulations Giveaway Winner

 

Via a drawing on random.org, the winner of the $25 gift certificate giveaway is #12, or Cathey, irishdancer2459. Please contact me by Monday at 5 PM to claim your prize. Thanks to everyone else for entering! Don't feel bad! You can have a free pocket mirror just for visiting my blog. Enter the coupon code: FREEMIRRORMAY when you check out from Literary Tease, and you'll get a free pocket mirror of your choice from my shop + 1% off your entire purchase. Please don't enter the mirror in your cart -- instead, leave me a message to seller telling me the mirror you'd like to receive for free.


Got giveaway fever?
Here are some other giveaways taking place right now:


Win a stash bag of cute fabric from Fairy Face Designs.


Win an awesome Elmer's gift pack from The Path Before Me.

Found Poetry: Special Needs Lizard

Have you entered my giveaway yet? You could win a $25 gift certificate to Literary Tease! (Hurry... contest ends Friday @ 5 PM!)

I'm preparing for a move into a new and smaller apartment, which means that I have to destash EVERYTHING! I'm making huge piles of stuff to donate, stuff to sell, and stuff to throw away. As I was cleaning, I came across this notecard that features a poem that I wrote at some point, who knows when. I rarely write poems, but I usually like the ones I do write. I'm pretty sure it was inspired by Kat, who always liked to bring home animals to the apartment she shared with Mel. I figured I'd share it here then I can throw the notecard into my recycling bin. So here goes:

Special Needs Lizard
by Moira

Unloved by the child whose Christmas was gay,
Missing an eye, part of an ear and its leg,
Hot sand rehabilitation on a Saturday night.

When the lizard ceases,
as it surely will,
there will be another in a short line of scaly others,
each homelier than the last,
needing religious devotion,
and plenty of fresh flies culled by hand,
from the sweaty desert heat.

The flies circle her skirts,
pulsing purple, turquoise on fire,
& the bells of a million stars,
twinkling at her heels.

Swirling, she clucks and coos in psuedo-lizard tongue,
and, loves, without question,
the beast.

Random Musings: World's Smallest Book

First of all: have you entered my giveaway yet? You could win a $25 gift certificate to Literary Tease! (Contests end April 29th @ 5 PM)

Tiny books, coptic-stitch, made by me

I wasn't so foolhardy as to believe that the tiny coptic-stitch books I made last year after taking a bookbinding class with Joann of Paper Girls Studio were tiny enough to be considered for the title of World's Smallest Books, but compared to the book that actually has that title, my books are positively gargantuan!

Second book - 2.5 inches x 2 inches

When I came home from my bookbinding lesson, I decided to try my hand at making a smaller book that my original (7 inches x 4 inches). My second book measures 2.5 inches tall by 2 inches wide. But that still wasn't small enough!

Third book - 2 x 1.25 inches

My third book is even smaller at 2 inches by 1.25 inches. Could I go smaller? I sure could!

Fourth book - 1.25 inches x 1 inch

The smallest book measures 1.25 inches by 1 inch. I did the stitching a little too tight; I suspect I was getting tired by that point. The book won't stay closed flat. I meant to add a tie to it, like the other two miniature books, but never did get around to it. I made the signature using scraps of watercolor paper and  pages from a copy of Alice in Wonderland, which just seemed appropriate.

Coptic-stitch bound

Still, despite being very small, this book is giant compared to the tiny book owned by Mark Palkovic. His tiny volume .9 x .9 millimeters. You read that right. Millimeters. Not centimeters. Millimeters. Go, right now, look at a ruler to get a sense of just how small that is. How would you even look at it? Apparently, only 100 copies of the book were made, and I just bet that over half of them were lost or accidentally inhaled! In fact, the book is so small, that Palkovic keeps a larger copy of the book around to show people:

Guinness World Records has confirmed that Palkovic is the owner of the smallest book in the world. Palkovic's book, Chekhov's Chameleon, measures just .9 by .9 millimeters, not much larger than a grain of salt. Amazingly, this miniscule book has 30 pages and three color illustrations. The print cannot be read by the naked eye, but Palkovic keeps another larger copy of the book, still measuring just a tiny 2 by 1.8 centimeters, nearby.

The "larger" copy is still about 1/3 the size of my smaller book. Wow.

Here's my favorite part of the article:

As for the tiniest book in the world, Palkovic does not just let it sit in its decorative collector's box. Even though it's as small as a little grain of salt, he has to take it out and look at the book, bound in gold and silk. "If you ever get a miniature book, you will never lose it," he says. "You may not be able to find it for awhile, but you'll come across it again. You just tend to put it somewhere safe because it's a treasured little thing."

So, what are your thoughts about tiny books? Ever made one? Own one?

Random Musings: World's Largest Book

First of all: have you entered my giveaway yet? You could win a $25 gift certificate to Literary Tease! (Contests end April 29th @ 5 PM)

For some reason, last night as I was falling asleep, I started wondering about the world's largest book. I have this huge board, 4 foot by 8 foot, in my studio and I was imagining how I would make it into a coptic-stitch bound book using rope. (Books were on my mind, I think, because I made two finished journals and two almost finished ones yesterday.) I asked Nick how big he thought the world's biggest book would be, and he, half asleep, muttered a number that seemed way too small. No, I said, I bet it's huge. Well, he said, I'm sorry, but I'm too tired to look. I wasn't going to get up to research it either, and figured I'd probably forget all about it by morning. And I did. But Nick didn't.

So what do you think? How big is the world's biggest book? According to Nick's research, this is it:

Source: http://www.luxuo.com/events/worlds-biggest-atlas-book-fair-frankfurt.html

The 128-page page atlas measures 6 x 9 feet and debuted at the Frankfurt Book Fair in October 2010. It's part of a limited edition run of 31 and has 128 pages. The article states that the book took three hours to get into position for the book fair and requires a man's full strength to turn the pages. I think it would be so cool to see this book in person. Maybe the RISD museum will buy one?

Second in line to the atlas is Bhutan, a book published by Michael Hawley of the MIT Media Lab in 2003.

Source: http://www.lib.washington.edu/specialcoll/exhibits/bhutan/book1.jpg

"Bhutan: A Visual Odyssey Across the Last Himalayan Kingdom" weighs in at more than 130 pounds and stands at five by seven feet, nearly as big as a Ping-Pong table. The book features more than 100 pages of spectacular images of a country often referred to as "the last Shangri-la," and showcases a variety of new digital, photographic and printing techniques.

The rest of the MIT press release details the making of the book and is definitely worth a read.

The third largest book, 2nd largest atlas, is the Klencke Atlas, which was presented to Charles II of England on his restoration.

Source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010/jan/26/klencke-atlas-british-library-exhibition

The book, owned by the British Library, is 350 years old and measures 5ft 10in by 3ft 5 in. It's 4 inches thick.

Here's an interesting entry on Wikipedia about the world's largest stone book, which stands upright and resides in the Kuthodaw Pagoda in Myanmar. It's not the type of book I was thinking about when I thought about giant books, but it's still worth a read! (The entry I mean, not sure about the book!)

Stop back tomorrow and we'll talk about books at the opposite end of the spectrum! How small do you think a book can be?

Craft Serendipity: Freezer Paper Journal Covers

First of all: have you entered my giveaway yet? You could win a $25 gift certificate to Literary Tease!

Today I'm going to give you the basics on how to make this:

Freezer Paper Journal Cover

But, first, a story: I recently made a lot of sheets of stitch paper as described in Kelli Nina Perkins awesome book, Stitch Alchemy. The fabric / paper fusion material uses large sheets of freezer paper as a base. Instead of throwing away the freezer paper away after I peeled the stitch paper from it, I've been using it as a base for messy art projects. I put the shiny side down on my work table and work on the non-shiny side.

As I was working on my studio tasks for today, I needed to clear my craft table for another project. I looked at the sheet of freezer paper and decided it was much too pretty to throw away. It's covered in bright spray paint splatters, messy paint drips and splatters, and shiny streaks of gel medium, and it's beautiful. I put it off the the side and once my table was cleared, I started on my first project of the day: making a canvas-bound art journal for myself.

Nancy Rafi, of Rafi Designs, makes gorgeous hard-bound journals and I've been wanting one of my own for months. Hers are beautiful, but I wanted a nice blank journal that I could decorate myself. Plus, I like working in 8 x 10 size, and hers are 8 x 8. When I asked Nancy about her source for the book cloth tape, the only thing I didn't have on hand in my studio, she was kind enough to send me a sample. You'll be seeing more of my journal soon, I'm sure, but here's the blank journal I made:

After making the journal, I had leftover strips of Fabriano Artistico paper which were just the right size to make mini journals, 5 x 6.25 inches. I didn't have canvas in the right size and didn't feel like cutting any boards down to size, so I needed something else to make the cover. I turned around, looking for inspiration, and I saw the freezer paper. Perfect!

I tore pieces of freezer paper to fit the cover and headed to my sewing machine to sew the paper onto the first folded page in the journal. Just before I started, I realized that I'd probably want to cover the stitches on the back of the cover and that using the Artistic paper was probably a waste for the cover. (I love Fabriano Artistico hot press 140 lb watercolor paper, but it's expensive, for paper: $4 a sheet.) Instead, I came back to my studio and grabbed a few 8.5 x 11 sheets of cardstock from my printer. This actually turned out to be a great idea!

I used a zigzag stitch to sew the freezer paper right in the center of the page. I considered trying to line up the edges, but it's actually better to have some room around the edges. You can't pin the paper into place, so it might move on you when you first start. I sewed around all the edges, overlapping a little bit at the end. Be careful to stay on the freezer paper when you are stitching. You'll be trimming this later and won't want to accidentally cut the stitches.

Accidentally beautiful scrap!

For the first journal, I then trimmed the cardstock to fit the freezer paper, which I already measured to fit the journal. I folded this in half and will be binding the journal with a simple pamphlet stitch. For the next two journals, I decided that it would be better to coat the whole thing front and back with gel medium (allowing one side to dry before doing the other). Then, I cute a piece of rice paper to cover the stitching and glued it in place with gel medium. I let this dry overnight. Then, I'll trim the cover, fold, and bind. This will give the stitches more strength and make the cover better lasting.

This is pre-rice paper but shows how the journal will work.

You could definitely bind the three signatures together for a chunky, awesome journal, but I think I'm going to leave them as three separate mini journals. Each one has three small pages of watercolor paper folded in half. They will make a great travel journal to toss in my bag before a trip (like New York next month!). If you don't already know how to do a pamphlet stitch, I found this tutorial at Sarah Nielsen's blog.

[Note: I always sew my pamphlets so that the tied ends are on the outside. This way when I'm done working in the journal, I can add beads or other adornments! I don't recommend adding adornments until after you're finished working inside the journal because the beads tend to fall off and/or get in the way.]

Giveaway: $25 Gift Certificate to Literary Tease

{Note: Giveaway is now closed & a winner has been announced here}

Maybe you've been eyeing up the items in my shop, Literary Tease, but you haven't bought anything yet. Or maybe you have already made an order, but you want to try a new product. Or maybe you need an awesome gift for your Mom this Mother's Day, but you have no idea what to get her!

Enter this giveaway for your chance to win a $25 gift certificate to Literary Tease. You can use the certificate to buy great Literary-themed jewelry and accessories for yourself or your friends. The certificate is valid for anything in the store and, yes, it can be applied towards your shipping costs, too. In fact, if you want a custom order, such an a locket with your choice of word or picture or a custom pocket mirror with your own photograph or drawing on it, you can your your certificate for that, too. Finally, if you'd like to get a gift for someone, you can give them the gift certificate so they can choose their own present. (They'll just need to let me know who gave them the certificate, or, conversely, you tell me who will be using it.)

You get up to 6 entries:

1 entry - leave me a comment and tell me your favorite item in the shop and what you like about it
1 entry - leave another comment and tell me what you'd like to see in my shop in the future
1 entry - like Literary Tease on Facebook and leave a comment telling me you did
1 entry - follow Crafty Moira on blogger and leave a comment telling me you did
1 entry - tweet about the contest and leave a comment telling me you did
1 entry - tell your friends on Facebook about the contest in your status and leave me another comment

(Note if you already follow my blog or like me on Facebook, just leave me a comment telling me your already do!)

Your last day for entries is one week from today: 5 PM on Friday, April 29th. The winner will be picked using a random number generator and posted here on May 1st.

(Note: I heard that some people might be having trouble leaving comments. If that's the case for you, please send me an email at moira{dot}richardsonATgmail and I will enter you manually!)

Tarot Girl

Tarot Girl, a photo by literarytease on Flickr.

copyright 2011 moira richardson

I apologize to anyone who's completely bored with me posting drawings this week! I'm admittedly obsessed! Something clicked in my head recently and now I'm a drawing fiend.

I started my current journal on April 11th. It has 60 pages, one of which I used to make a marker color chart, another which I tore out to use underneath drawing to prevent marker bleeds. It's now April 21 and I have only three blank pages left in my book! Wow! Granted, most of my sketches are one sided, but that's still a crapload of sketching in ten days!

For this lady, I used a Copic Multiliner Pen .8 to outline the girl, .3 to outline the cards and necklace. Forgot to color the backs of the cards before I scanned! I am using Shinhan Touch Twin markers for shading, a white Uni-Ball Signo pen for highlights, and .3 multiliner pen for eyelashes.