Book-a-Day: Day 5

My few-and-far-between posts for Dan Essig's Book-a-Day class at BookWorks have become more like a book-a-month. But if not timely, I'm nevertheless tenacious, so here's the fifth and final installment in the series (scroll down -- skipping the X-Files post -- to see the rest). Our fifth book had us working with leather and another long-stitch binding. The stitch is surprisingly simple;the trick is getting started, since it's not an intuitive beginning. Dan demonstrated several closures, and I chose one of the simplest: one end of a long leather strip (trimmed to a point at one end, and wider at the opposite end) goes in through a slit in the fold-over cover, approximately three-quarters-of-an inch from the edge; comes out the cover via another slit approximately one-quarter-of-an-inch from the edge. Make a hole with a Japanese hole punch at the other, wider, end of the strip, through which you'll slip the end of the strip that's emerged from the slit in the book. Presto! You can now wrap the strip around your book and slip the pointed end through the space between the book and the wider end of the strip. Simple but effective.

I love this fat little book (approximately 3 1/2" x 4 1/8" closed). It's a perfect keep-in-your-bag journal. Here are a few photos of the book, and some additional treats:

My friend Priscilla and her collection

Lisa and three of her books

A long-stitch book from Dan's collection that he bought from a student in Boston. Every stitch is functional, not just decorative!

Some of the wonderful awls that Dan makes and sells.