Hand Stitched Book Tutorial

Hi everyone! I shared this tutorial on The Twinery's blog a few weeks ago, but in case you missed it, I'll share it here today. Grab your supplies and make a handmade book bound with twine! I used the beautiful Blossom, Caribbean and Lilac twine for this girly book.

Here is your supply list:

The first step is to trim your copy paper sheets to 8.5x10. Fold them all in half with nice, sharp creases. Then you will make 2 sets of 6 sheets put inside of each other. If you want a bigger book, by all means add more sets of paper! Next, take your cover paper and put the papers inside to see where you want to fold the cover over.

You will leave a longer edge on the right for a flap.

Next, measure and poke holes one and two inches from each side right on the crease. You will do this on both sets of paper. Since the cover is a bit larger than the pages, you will now line your paper up inside your cover and then poke through the holes in the paper

to make the holes in the cover.

Next, put your first set of papers in the cover and start stitching it in by starting going down through the bottom hole and then up the next, etc., leaving a tail at the bottom hole.

You will stitch back down and should end up with this:

Tie a regular ol' tight double knot at the bottom like below,

then sew in your second set of papers.

Here comes the fun part- decorating the cover! I used a border punch to make the flap have a scalloped edge. I sewed a cute button on where I wanted the closure to be, then I used a sticky-backed velcro circle to hold it together.  I also added a glassine envelope inside the back cover for her to add anything she wants to collect.

I made a twine tassel and added a few pretty buttons to it to hang off the twine used for the binding on the edge.

I cut a cute dress and dressed up a little,

then added my daughter's name on top.

These books are pretty quick to make for gifts, or just for yourself. Play around with them by making different sizes, too. The sky's the limit on these fun little books!