DIY Book Ornament

 

Now that I've finished my PhD, I've finally had the chance to get back into reading, and have been chipping away at the edits on my novel, which has been in the works for a while now.  I thought it would be fun to make a book ornament for my tree to celebrate my writing progress as well as my return to reading.  I used scrap paper to make the pages for my ornament, and since the scrap paper happened to have text from my work in progress, I decided to make a mock cover for my work in progress.  Now my novel is actually a horror novel, so this mock cover does not at all give the right impression, but I didn't have a lot of time to work on it and there's a good amount of symbolism in it, so it worked for me.  I've included my mock cover below in the directions section, in case you wanted to use it, but if you google miniature book cover, you can find tons of printable book covers that are free for personal use.

Materials:

*Matte photo paper
*Scrap or plain printer paper
*Two jump rings
*Two pairs of jewelry pliers
*Sewing needle
*Ribbon or thread
*Glue
*Ruler
*Pencil
*Scissors

Directions:

*Print out a copy of your cover design onto matte photo paper.  I'm including the mock cover I made below, but you can also find tons of printable mini book covers online that are free for personal use.

*Cut out your book cover image and fold it into a cover shape.

*Using a ruler and pencil, section your paper into strips.  Mine were a little over 1.5" wide, the width of the ruler, but you may want to make yours larger or smaller, depending on the desired size of your ornament.  (I messed up on the first strip, so that's why there's a set of double lines.)

*Cut out your strips and accordion fold them to fit inside your book.

*Use a sewing needle to poke a hole in the spine of the cover and link two jump rings through the hole.

*Cluster your accordion folded pages together and glue them into the spine of the book.

*Slide some ribbon or thread through the top jump ring and tie it off to form a loop so you can hang up your ornament.

And that is how you can make your very own book ornaments.  I'm excited for this new addition to my tree, and hopefully in a few years I'll be able to make a different one with the actual cover for this novel :)