Wednesday 19 December 2007

Maze Book

Time is fast running out to finish off Christmas presents, but if you need a quick make as a gift why not have a go at making a maze book, it can be made and decorated in an hour.

Supplies
1 sheet 12x12 cardstock
Two 8.5cm x 8.5cm squares of thicker card or chipboard to make the covers
1/4" Ribbon, about 1 yard
patterned papers and embelishments to decorate

We will make the covers first
Take 1 of your 8.5cm x 8.5cm squares of thick card and cut 2 squares of your patterned paper about 10.5cm x10.5cm.

Glue 1 of your cardboard covers onto the centre of 1 of your squares of patterned paper, I found a wet glue to be the best for this.


Next we need to mitre the corners of the patterned paper. Cut the corners of the patterned paper a couple of mm from the thick card



Now we need to fold 2 of the edges of the paper in around the thick card, then open the edges back out and glue down, press the sides down making sure the adhesive has stuck the edges down firmly.

Fold in the little flap of patterned paper at each corner, just like you do when wrapping a present. This will guve nice neat corners.




Wrap the two remaining flaps around the thick card and glue down. While the glue is still wet, press along the edges of the covered thick card to square off the edges.


Repeat the above to create the second cover for your maze book.





Now you have made the covers, put them to one side and we will make the pages for our books.

Take your sheet 12x12 cardstock and fold in half, I used a bone folder to make the creases nice and sharp.

Then fold the free edge of the card back to the centre fold.



Do the same thing on the other side



Then unfold your sheet of card and it should look like the picture below



Turn your sheet of card so the folds lie horizontally, then we are going to fold the card in half again, repeating what we did before.


Then fold the free edge of the card back to the centre fold.

Do the same thing on the other side


Unfold the cardstock and you will see you have created 16 squares with your folding!


Now we have done all the folding we can create our maze book.

Take some scissors or a craft knife and make the cuts as shown in the picture below.





Now you need to fold your cardstock , start folding from the bottom left square. Keep following the folds and flip your pages over




When you have folded all the pages you are left with a nice little stack of pages


Now we need to put it all together.

Take your 2 covered card squares and place them side by side about 1.5cm apart, with the inside facing up.

Run a line of adhesive horizontally across the centre of each cover.

Lay your ribbon across the glue line so there is an equal amount of ribbon on either side of the covers and press down to make sure the ribbon is attached securely.


Now take your stack of folded card and isolate the first page.



Stick this page to your front cover, making sure you centre it on your cover, press down firmly to make sure the card is attached to the cover.



Now do the same with the back page and back cover






Your book is now ready for you to decorate





I hope these instructions make sense but if they dont and you have any questions just leave a message here and I will try to answer any questions
Deb x

2 comments:

Deb said...

thank you so much for this post - what brilliant photos and instructions - thank you for going to so much trouble - I am definately going to give this a go.

Anonymous said...

WOW... another great example of a maze book. I first saw this on craft tv weekly and made a blank book, it's so inexpensive, seeing this has given me a spur to finish it off now!