Fabulous & Fun Fridays - How To Inspire A Stranger

When I was a young girl I once found a tiny little journal in a box of random stuff that had come from either an auction or a yard sale.  This little journal was filled with random words and pictures, lots of sparkles, ribbons and bits, I used to believe that it had once belonged to a fairy and so I called it my fairy journal.  Later in life I learned that there are apparently lots of fairy journals, and yes they really are called fairy journals, circulating around our earth.  They are tiny books designed to enchant and inspire their finder and be kept forever and treasured or passed along to delight the next person to uncover its secrets.  When I had reached my teens, while doing a major clean out of my room I once again came across my little fairy journal and decided that it could be put to better use to work it's magic again rather then sitting in a dusty old box in the back of my closet; and so I put it in a bag to good will and after that I can not tell you it's fate, but I like to believe that some other young girl or boy came across it and thought that they had uncovered a magical secret book full of enchantment and delight.  Over the years every once in a while I get that itch to put together my very own fairy journal that I can leave in a place to be found by a young person and fill their hearts with that same magical enchantment that I once felt and hopefully inspire them full of creativity.  With that being said that brings me to this weeks tutorial How To Inspire A Stranger......

What you will need:

• a few random pages, from an old book or where ever make it interesting 
• piece of cotton canvas or leather (or whatever you would like to use for the cover)
• watered down white paint and any other color you may want to use
• sparkles
• markers or crayons or pencil crayons
• ribbons, stickers, old stamps, ticket stubs, etc. (you decide how you want to design it, be creative)
• glue
• hole punch or you can use a nail or awl with a hammer
• scissors

My Fair Journal

Step 1

Gather together some random pages of paper and lay them out to white wash them with watered down white  paint

I like to white wash both sides completely and then go back and add some other colors here and there for flare and then top them all off with sparkles while the pages are still wet so that they will stick.

You want to be totally random with this and if it starts to look like a big mess, don't worry that's what you want it to look like lol

Step 2

After you finish adding the color and sparkles, your pages should be pretty wet and will need to dry out before you can proceed with them so set them aside.  While your pages are drying out you can work on your cover.  For this journal today I used cotton canvas for the outside of the cover and a sheet of sparkly foam for the inside of the cover. 

First I painted the cotton with a sponge just randomly sponging on blue and pink paint until the whole thing was covered, then while the paint was still wet I sprinkled pink sparkles all over it.

I also sprayed it with a glossy varnish which will help to protect the paint and keep the sparkles from falling off.  Once it was dry I could attach the sparkly foam to the back of it, which is really easy considering its sticky on one side so just have to simply peel of the backing and stick it on, then trim off the excess.

Step 3

Once all of your pages are completely dried out you can complete them by doodling on them, adding ribbons, stickers, stamps, ticket stubs, old stamps, etc. etc.  This part is where you should use your imagination and be creative.  For the journal I did today for this tutorial I will admit I was extremely pressed for time and running out of daylight to be able to photograph it all as I go. So I gave half of the pages to my husband to do for me so you will see his artistic handy work on a lot of it lol.  I will also have to admit that because I rushed through this whole thing that this is not one of my best journals to date as I accidently attached a few of the pages in upside down and didn't realize it until I was done. lol

STEP 4

Using either a whole punch or an awl or nail with a hammer you can punch 3 or 4 holes down side for the binding.  Then using either yarn or hemp you can bind the pages inside the cover through the holes that you created down the side.  When you are finished it will look something like this...

I was also able to convince my husband to help me out to photograph the pages inside of this journal so that isn't my manly hand in the photos lol  So here is a look through of today's fairy journal...

This journal will now be left strategically outside near my next door neighbors house so that their young daughter will hopefully find it as she is an aspiring artist.  I have given her a bunch of  old canvas's and old paints of mine and she has been creating some wonderful stuff so I hope this will inspire more creativity in her.   Fairy journals can be created and left anywhere for a stranger to find but I personally like to make sure that its a young person that finds the ones I make because I think the experience for a child can seem almost magical to them.  Happy creating!