Titled with title stuff

Don't use tumblr much, but lets see how it goes.

[mistressdragonflame]

All Along is All Done!

Wash rinse repeat for laziness, which is why it took so long, but I have completed the @theggning All Along the Watchtower!

First I trimmed the edges, feeling pretty confident.

Unfortunately, it was a false feeling, and 2 of the 3 sides were kind of shit. Ah well. I didn't do end bands, because I forgot, but its not like it was needed.

The next bit was to print the design. I knew I wanted a few different layers, but, uh....

Uh, more intimidating when all 4 layers are picked out. Whoo boy.

It took a while to print. Not just in the actual printing, but fighting with the bloody SVE file! Ugh, hours of my life trying to get the multiple colors (which I had made out of two solid colors to avoid much issue) and fuck me, did the file hate it. Blurred, random lines, adding color where the was none--a struggle. Weirdly, a different issue than my Inquisitor symbol, where it wanted more layers in the color scape, this one I did 4 layers and it worked better than 30 or more. Fuck me why.

I eventually had to split the image into multiple uploads. The orange/black, and the separate, the colors for the Nick Valentine sign. Solved a lot of issues by separating those, which took a bit to figure out before it worked.

Anyway, I completed it, and uploaded it, and cut them.

That's not actually white there, it's a very faint pink. Figured it would work best for the sign.

Next was the weeding... so much weeding.

Annnnnddd...

Fucking hell, why does my Cricut hate me and my fonts? Like, this is a typewriter font for fucks sake, not some cursive fancy shit. I attempted to salvage this one for probably too long, before my laptop upended and I lost some letters that had been pulled off accidentally and at that point I just gave up and reprinted a larger font. 2nd go around wasn't as bad.

While that 2nd attempt was printing, I ironed on the first pieces, layer by layer.

The bronze of the four looked like shit when I weeded it, hopefully layering will look good when put all together.

I finished the weeding and ironing, and glued in the booklet. Carefully matching the arrows to be sure the booklet is in the correct orientation.

And it is done! Look at how fantastic it is!!

The bronze looks soooo good! I love how that came out. The sign could be a bit better, the sve fucking hated the layered pinks for some reason, and refused to let the hot pink colored not be weirdly cut up on the interior.

But it is le done. I'm going to force my husband, who is a huge fallout fan and holds a British BA in writing, but weirdly hates reading, into reading this. He won't have an excuse now since its in print.

Now what's next?

[mistressdragonflame]

I have been lazy

It has been spring break for me, and as I don't have a job this time, it's actually a break for me. I have been enjoying the lack of anything a lot, just lazing about watching youtube or reading. I did work on the next bind, but I honestly could have done more if I wasn't lazing.

As is my process, I hunkered down near my printer and folded each signature as they printed, boning both sides before setting it to the side.

Total, there was 14 signatures, a decent size. I decided to not use cords for this one, and just do a French stitch.

I also picked the fabric for the background. It's a crushed-textured maroon-ish red. The picture below is a bit brighter than it is IRL, so I think it'll work well with the brick motif on the back.

I put the signatures into my press to crunch a bit more, and if you were keeping track, yes, this is slightly different. I swapped the monkey wood with a larger selection of lychee wood. Bloody beautiful wood, imo. It allows more flex in the placing of the booklets, as its wide enough to fit them sideways.

Next, endpapers.

I still wanted to stitch on the end papers, as I like that method most, but what to pick? I don't have an indefinite pile of end papers to use (yet.... don't tell my husband), so of the ones I had I needed to choose. I was really debating between the blue/gold/white one and the green/white one on top, as they were closest to Fallout world as possible.

Husband, who is a huge fallout fan and got me into the series, said this one looked most like wallpaper you'd find in one of those old pre-war houses, and I agreed.

Next, stabbing.

I made a new template to use, as the corded one wouldn't work with a french stitch. You spot the error on this? I sure didn't. You can even see my planning map work on the newspaper. Poor fool.

Blithely, I went along and stabbed ALL the signatures. And Endpapers. It wasn't until I began stitching that I noticed.

See it? Right, I didn't have enough holes for a french stitch--they require even holes, and I had 7 total. Whoops. And, sucks to suck, there was no real way to correct it either.

I had to print, bone, press, and stab the whooooole thing.

WASTE.

But once I wash-rinse-repeat-ed the process, the 2nd french worked out just well. I did keep the OG end papers, and just kind of ignored the misaligned holes.

So I got it all stitched, it looks lovely, and I glued it down. Thats where it's at now, waiting for me to not be lazy. Not much left beyond casing the book, and then the print/weeding. Maybe I'll do that today. I have an essay due Thursday I'm avoiding, after all.

Till next time.

[mistressdragonflame]

All Along the Watch...me do these things

So, I decided to branch off into another fandom of mine, Fallout 4, and bookbind a very lovely Danse and Valentine story, All Along the Watchtower. Not a Danse/Valentine, but an essentially forced buddy cop situation. Delightful story written by AO3 name GGMoonyCrisco and tumblr @theggning.

As is with all of my self-imposed hobbies, I started by making the typeset. It's a slow process as I scrubbed through for any formatting issue that cropped up between the AO3 save file to the Google Docs I use to organize it. For some reason this time the additional line space between paragraphs could only be manually removed--ugh, each and every page I had to comb through to ensure it was spaced appropriately. Slow crawl. IDK why it didn't allow a one and done fix as it had with the other works I typeset, but whatever.

Then I started to design the casebook. This is probably my most complex yet, as there wasn't one set imagery I was thinking. I went with a kind of clockwork design behind the Brotherhood seal as the cover, since this is set post Synth reveal, and used the same imagrey for the borders. The rear I dedicated to Valentine, and made it an approximation of his agency. Whoo boy, this'll be interesting to print. I'll have four colors total, I think. Black, white, pink, and shiny metalic bronze. Last I'm not sure about, but I want something metalic and I think it'd look good.

Here's what I got so far.

I may go back and erase the brick lines behind the font. I don't know just yet.

Secondly, I may swap one of the gears inside the brotherhood seal to the metalic, giving a nose tap to Danse's synth being. I will go back and clean up the edges, certainly, but its a good approximation for now.

Don't know what material I want to do yet for the background. Liking the brick color, as it'll work best with the rear. The white font here are approximations, as I know better than to try and import it over to Inkscape. The Valentine sign however, is hand drawn and I'll hand import it over. Ugh. not looking forward to that inevitable fight.

Thats it for now! Onward.

[noodle-the-queen]

Ao3 does not need an algorithm, you're just lazy

Ao3 does not need a 1-5 star rating system, you just want to bring down authors writing for FREE

Ao3 does not need automatic censorship, it is an archive, therefore anything can be posted

Writing or reading about something illegal does not mean the author nor the reader condones it, if that were true, you could never read a story involving anything negative

Purity culture is ruining fan culture and you all are fucking annoying

[mistressdragonflame]

Dreaming Red, complete!

After a busy work weekend, I skivved off my single class this Monday and recovered and finished the last little bits.

I spread the cord, which is notably easier than the garden cord I had used before.

I also finished making the case.

I actually made it a tad too large--about a quarter of an inch on both ends. But eh. I printed the various layers for HTV, and began weeding.

Nope, the HTV did not like that font. Refused to peel easily, and it was a struggle. I had to reprint it in a different font.

I did so using the scraps, and while those printed, I ironed on the ones that worked out well.

Man, I love how that came out. Big crystal is a tad off center, but its asymmetrical anyway.

I re-weeded the words, slapped them on, and glued in the booklet.

Ta-dah! Came out wonderfully. I really like the cover artwork on this piece, though the endbands are not the prettiest. Eh, whatever.

Now, to figure out what to work on next.

[mistressdragonflame]

I'm working on it I swear

As a student, it behooves me to delay school work and do anything else. But I have been working on the Dreaming Red bind, just... slower as I got distracted by some truly lovely Varric/Cassandra stories on AO3 I hadn't seen before.

I printed the leaflets of Dreaming Red, as it was only 100k words so pretty short comparison. Didn't take me too long.

Then I pulled a Cassandra and stabbed the shit out of the books.

But like with an Awl not a dagger as in DA2. I cheated and used Lionheart's guide for the punching. What, it is an easy good set! Now, this book is small enough it didn't need cords, but eh. I wanted to.

I also went again to sewing on the end papers. I bought this cardstock a while ago, and had no idea what to use it for. Doesn't quite match the book, but the best of what I got. And its pretty.

Then it was back to sewing.

There was like 17 signatures, so this didn't take me too long. Same night I got it done, and glued it down. No need for rounding for this one.

I sadly still don't have black leather, so I am making a full, not bumpy spine cover. I found some pure black satin in my fabric stash, and used that to make some bookfabric by gluing it to some heat'n'bond. But I also then trimmed the edges of the booklet with my prison shank chisel. Man, am I proud on how they came out!

Smooth as butter.

I also started to sew some headbands on. Yeah yeah, I know I didn't need to actually sew them in, but I like the process. This one was a bit of a pain in the ass, to be honest. The scrap bit of leather I picked was too thick, but I only realized half way so I pushed through. the other headband was used with some black cord.

I spent the next few days working on the design. The satin is black, so I was going for white of the Inquisition sign, and red for the dramatic bits.

I erased some bits of the white to make it seem like the crystals are breaking free of it, but as they have to print separately, here is for hoping they come out well. As you see, I ended up using both images (split and whole) which I feel come out well. The cover side will be on top of the big lyrium rock. The letters are all in red too. May have to redo the title, as it kind of goes over the lyrium crystal.

They're printing now, so it's just some weeding, ironing the HTV to the satin, and gluing the booklet in.

Woot!

[trippingontheescalator]

Sirius: "Snape knew more curses when he arrived at school than half the kids in seventh year."

11 year old Severus: "You motherfucking, shit-stained, cunt-mouthed little prick. Your chin looks like a ballsack and your droopy eye looks like the hood of a clit."

11 year old Sirius (crying): "I'm rubber, you're glue--"

[mistressdragonflame]

And now, for something different

Welp, the idea I had for my next two projects didn't pan out. So those are cannexed.

But I'm still ADHD fixated on bookbinding for the time, so I dug through some other AO3 works for inspiration.

I rediscovered a absolutely wonderful Dragon Age: Inquisition story, Dreaming Red by lizzledpink. A Cassandra/Varric, with focus on Cassandra. I absolutely loved this story when I read it a few years ago, and I think the book bind imagery will be absolutely wonderful.

So I checked if the Author allowed transformative works, and success! She does. Thus I made a typesetting for it, which took a bit. I also made a custom space breaker.

I know, perfection. It's smaller in the typeset, of course, so the tiny errors are invisible. Good enough for government work. (especially now) I scrubbed through for errors like I did Lionheart, fiddled with the format, and sent it to typeset.

(If you don't know, the series Dragon Age has a "Red Lyrium" which is a magical red rock that grows out of your skin and makes you a slave to an eternal Elvhen God. (Long story). This is a story based upon a failed alternative universe in which the two main characters die to it, and the in universe characters dream of that past life. Phenomenal story. I love me a strong female character lead, and Cassandra fits that bill so very well.)

Anyway, so I was thinking the book will be a black base, with white Inquisition eye sword thing, and have a red crystal boarders. I really want it in black leather, but I don't have any black leather, there is no leather shops on island, and it'd be three weeks before it came in the mail so thats out. Perhaps I have some fabric somewhere. I don't have the boarders made yet, but I did poke about the sword eye.

I yoinked the in game design, and played with either splitting it like the right image, or just leaving it whole and layering red font over. Both have their merits. I'm thus far going to try to keep it whole.

I did have to fuck around with the image in the Inkscape however, because its such a low resolution that the Cricut would probably explode trying to work it. It was a surprisingly pain in the ass.

For being black and white image, it refused to get a clear conversion. I had to get like 30 something colored layers to get it remotely good. And even then I had to go back through and clean up some random spikes that appeared within the tentacles.

Ugh.

But I eventually cleaned it up. So I should have a decent print when I carry it over, but first! Printing and squishing!

Till next time.

[mistressdragonflame]

Vol. II Book 4 done!

I have completed the second installment of @greenerteacups' Lionheart series!

It was minimal amount of work after the weeding of before, but spread over two days as I had to wait for glue to dry. I also printed and weeded two flames I thought would look good under the goblet. I printed two identical free image campfires from Cricut, then removed the wood logs and weeded out the parts I didn't want.

Then, I layered over the top. Thought it looked nice.

So the following morning I did the glue, scrape, glue method again with the wheat paste as it allows me time to manipulate the bookboards to proper position.

Yep, I used my military uniform measurement stick for the scraping of this.

I forgot to take pictures of the spine's wrap to get the hubs again, but imagine it like the first time, but with yellow instead of red.

I thought the last 3/8th of a inch gap was a bit tight in Vol. I, so I upped to 1/2 inch gap this time. Only way to find out would be once it was glued. I glued down the edges, and they came out ok. Not as good as the first time, weirdly. IDK why, I used the same template both times. I think maybe this skin was a tad bit thicker than the red skin, so was a bit harder to manipulate.

Next up was the cricut print! Since I had kept the print in position, it was significantly easier to apply this time. Only fiddly bits was the spine and the blue flame, which had to be layered application (light blue, dark blue, then black). I did change up the spine orintation to last time, and when I was applying this I realized I had forgotten the "Vol. I" and "Vol. II" I had intended. Whoops.

Still, came out well. I am very happy with the blue flame layering, even though the dark blue blends in a bit too well with the black. Decent in the light, but not on camera.

Then it was gluing in the text block! I freyed the cords, and removed the waste paper from the outside edge. I leveled off the inner board with some thin cardboard, glued the frayed cords then glued the outside edge paper to squish it together.

And done! It looks so good! I love how this came out. I like that the blue flame reaches under the title. I wish the dark blue was more visible against the black, but can't win it all.

Next up is... a surprise, I think. IDK, still working out the idea.

Or maybe just Vol. II(b) whenever it gets finished. Maybe by summer?

[mistressdragonflame]

I only have myself to blame, really

So I went to class this morning, and started to weed the cricut print.

The first half came out very nicely!

Edging went well, I didn't catch on anything. Easy peasy. The second half... not so much.

For some reason, the cricut decided to stop cutting all the way through the print at some point. So I was pulling the square edging off, and it just.... stopped.

You can see there on the corner I was trying to pry the supposed cut edge off, and it just wouldn't. It wasn't the only place either, it seemed like most of this side of the print just didn't cut through all the way. I don't know why.

Sooo I was like, "that was weird." But I printed the 2nd half again. This time I tried another print method, with the cricut going 2x over the print but not as much pressure. Hopefully the slight pulling up from the regular version wouldn't be as much of an issue with this method.

Oh boy, was I wrong. That print was shredded. All the way through the transfer plastic. Just chewed through. I had to scrape off plastic bits from the mat.

So flipped the vinyl over to print on the other side, going back to OG version. This came out well, and I got to weeding.

So.

much

weeding.

My god, the design was such a PITA to weed. I don't know if I could have made it better, because a large part was that I wasn't certain which part stayed and which was removed during the bulk of it.

I ended up laying on the couch, tweezers in one hand and my pointy stabbing weeding bit in the other, going slow section by slow section. I can't even be mad at anyone but myself since I picked this design.

My arm started to hurt from being crunched up so much, like literal hours. I'm getting old.

But eventually I got it done, and I had a fairly satisfying weed as I took all the outer layer at once. The words gave me trouble again, I don't know why cricut hates these words so much, but it does.

But its done, and I think it came out very nicely. I may layer some blue fire under the cup, I think it may look cool.

Onward!

[mistressdragonflame]

Just the cover left

A bit of a slower day, as I lazed about, panicked over possibly losing my wedding ring only to find it in a jacket pocket (after taking off the garbage disposal and digging through the trash cans), and now I'm waiting for the cricut to print.

Still struggling a bit with the prison shank chisel, as you can see the lines. But they cut well enough I suppose. Maybe I'll upgrade to a proper plough later if I keep this hobby up. Maybe.

So off I began with sewing the headbands, which took about a day to get both, if you add both hours worked. Better than before, but the yellow thread here was less favorable to use than the black cotton one.

But its late tonight, so thats it for me until tomorrow.

[mistressdragonflame]

Seems familiar...

So, bookbinding goes a lot faster once you got everything in place and have at least a vague idea of what you're doing.

Same day I finished Vol. I, I started to print and fold Vol. II(a). I settled into my akward spot next to the printer, using the cat box as a table.

I tried to ensure the papers were extra sharp. I did decide to redo the typeset into signatures of 5 vice 4, but I will see if it's better or worse than the first type. As it was late by then, I crushed the signatures in my nipping press overnight. Hopefully they'll be flat as much as they can be.

(spoiler, they were not).

The following day, I got out my cradle, stabbing guide, and awl, for stabbing the signatures.

I did notice that this print printed better. I think it's because I got a new ink container. First volume was the "come with" container, but that died at the end of the print. This was the replacement. Welp, it's better than before!

Once I finished the stabbing, it was back to sewing. I set up inside the house instead of on the lanai, as I wanted to spend more time closer with my husband. We have fairly independent hobbies, but it's still nice to sit in the same room with him. <3

I did decide to do a new technique with the end papers, sewing them in instead of gluing. I did something different than the guide, as I didn't want to have too many excess white papers at the start/end of the book, so I removed one of the inner pages after gluing it in.

And then it was back to sewing!

I used thicker thread than the Vol. I, 2nd attempt, but not as thick as the 1st. I made certain to bone the signatures before adding to the pile, and pressing while on the cords.

Still came out thicker than I'd like. I got lazy about half way through and stopped reboning the signatures, which is on me. But meh.

(also, side note, I find watching/listening to long form media the best bet for this as it prevents having to pause to select over/over again. For those curious, currently re-watching Critical Role, Season 2).

I got it done in only a few hours, so I set about trimming the fore edge again. I OSHA'ed the prison-shank chisel again, since I think the last time it was off and made the cut weird. I then resharpened it, and began to cut down.

Pretty good! Not perfect, not good enough for foiling if I wanted to, but good enough, IMO, as this edge especially is hidden by the spine rounding.

Next was glueing, then rounding and reglueing.

I attempted to give it shoulders again, but that's really a lost cause without backing boards. Which I do not have.

Then I picked out the colors to start on sewing on the headbands, to settle once again into sewing the headbands.

Only I realized after I set up I needed to trim the edges first. Obviously, can't trim after adding the headbands as they'll just be cut off if you do.

Welp, with it being dark out and frankly not wanting to do it now, I'll save the trimming for tomorrow.

Onward!

[mistressdragonflame]

Tah-dah!

I have finished Vol. I of @greenerteacups' Lionheart series!

First, I attached the book stock for the cover, and pressed it with the text block to seal. I also trimmed the edges to a uniform size, and cut off the corners to make it flush when folded.

While that dried, I re-printed the missing font on the circut, and printed the heart. My god.

Was this shit miserable. So many tiny details that did not want to come out. Perhaps next time I'll 2x the cut pattern. For some reason, a lot of the itty bitty bits were still connected to the main body, which just worsened the process.

Once I got sick of that, I glued down the corners. Yeah boy, did those come out nicely.

Looks a little suggestive if you stare too long. Should have seen it when the glue was still wet.

I then started arranging the cricut print. Low and behold, it didn't fit. So I had to chop off bits until it did.

But I got them on, and it looked great! You can see the lines from the glue sheet however, which I wasn't expecting and don't know how to counter. Except maybe print as whole piece and apply it all at once?

Friday following Thursday (which was very busy for me with school, work, and an early V-day dinner with husband), I finished the weeding of the heart and glued it carefully down. Looks good to me! I do need to clean off the excess glue thats on there though.

I also sized out the "by" and "bound by" lines, which were now too big to fit on the foot. So I moved the "bound by" to the spine.

I think the middle one shifted juuuuust a bit before I ironed it, but good enough, imo.

But then I layered the circle over the heart, and added the "by" line. Fantasic!

Next, to glue the text block into the case back!

A bit of glue, an hour or two in my handy press, and....

Done!

Bit of things need to fix is the cricut prints, as they're slight too large to fit. I also think a tad bit more space on the spine/card board panels would be better, even though I used 3/8 marker rather than 1/4. Probably the leather.

But what a fantastic ride! I enjoyed learning and getting this together, and posting the progress on this account.

Next up, Volume II (Book 4)!

[mistressdragonflame]

Lots of activity today--so close!

I got a lot of small things accomplished, so collectively it feels like I did a lot more than other days, though spent about the same time on it.

Firstly, finished the foot end piece in much better condition and speed than the head end piece. The leather core was the way to go.

I'll trim the edges and glue/burn them to prevent unraveling later.

Next, my wheat glue went bad (I think?) IDK, it was chunky so I remade it.

Much thicker than the last one, probably a bit too much flour. Eh, whatever. While that cooled I went to my tax class. Whooo. Taxes.

Anyway, after that was over, then I worked on the spine piece for the case cover, and let it dry. I am using a cut out of a round tube shipping container, which gives itself a curve, which I know is not a common thing. Eh, whatever.

Not pictured, me trimming the long edges to a curve so it blends better when applied. I made the strips by layering two scraps of leather together and slicing them into strips once dried.

Next, I tested the eyesore that was the test HTV onto a scrap piece of leather. I think I pressed a bit hard.

But it worked out well. Surprisingly, the red dulled down the neon green quite a bit, so it looked a bit like my first digital draft, lol. The texture is nice too, no ridges and well applied once it cooled and I could peel the protective plastic off.

After that, I decided between the two golds HTVs I had for the final print. I decided on the non-shiny one, as its less offensive. Though I did think about possibly using the metallic one for the title. But I am undecided.

So I fought with the cricut for a bit (WHY is it so damned hard to work?? Seriously, damned thing is such shitty software) and left it to print.

Meanwhile, I was gluing up the spine to store the loose threads from the headpieces. The further edge is the first interation.

Then I ate dinner and showered, and the cricut was done printing. So off I went to weeding.

Slowly, sloooooowlly.....

FUCK

Whyyyyy does it hate my nice fonts so much? The blockier fonts were fine, but these all died painful deaths. I'm going to have to reprint and try and figure out the minimum size required. Not 15, as pictured.

The rest of it turned out well, just the "Wizard of the Moon" font did not like Cricut and cricut did not like it. At least, in smaller. The spine test prints I did both came out nicely.

But by now the multi-layers of wheat glue on the spine had... IDK, matured? I don't know why you layer paste, wait, scrape it off, layer, wait, scrape it off, layer paste, then apply the spine. But eh, that's what I did.

I then tried to define the bump outs by using some string. They're not as predominate as I'd like, so that's future me to figure out.

I also still don't know what I'm going to do about the wax seal image. Eh, future me problem.

Woot, woot!

[mistressdragonflame]

This takes FOREVER

Headbands, I have learned, suuuuck. Especially depending on how you work the materials.

I came home after school and started working on finishing the headband. I got into a somewhat rhythm, but vowed to search for better material for the footband.

The satin-y fabric I have for the core here was very slippery, and allowed the thread to just go everywhere, so I swapped it out for some leather bits for the 2nd part. I also googled some silk thread, which apparently is typically used rather than the poly I am currently (hopefully it didn't twine as this one).

Unfortunately, could not locate silk thread in the colors I wanted from a trustworthy website, as lord knows there probably isn't any on island. If they weren't out of black, they were out of gold, etc, etc.

So I started on the foot and now, near bedtime, I got thiiis far:

Probably a half inch every hour, ugh. I will say there is a different learning curve from leather to poly core, and the leather is overall better in that the thread doesn't slip away from the wraps if you don't maintain tension 100% of the time. Unfortunately, it makes shifting the threads a PITA, but it's easier to compensate for this than the slippery mess of the poly cord.

And that's it for today. Not much left to do with this, tbh, once I finish this I'll turn to the leather case book and then iron on the HTV. Then slap these bitches together, and start on Vol. II(a)!

Onward!

[mistressdragonflame]

Bit of a slower weekend

Well, this weekend after the havoc of last weekend was significantly slower. I lazed about some and went shooting with my husband.

I printed the test run of the Lionheart Vol. I vinyl, and man, is that a blindingly bright color. The words came out significantly better this time than with the Perfect Match print, but I decided to download some different fonts from default that I liked better. Hopefully they'll come out.

But over all, the print came out well. Makes my eye hurt though if I look at it too far. I am glad I did a full test print, as Cricut fucked around with the SVE for some reason and tried to print the single image onto two different sheets. It also cut off some of the design, since the two halfs weren't perfectly inline with each other. Can only tell close up, but I'D KNOW.

I managed to position the #2 sheet into the gap on the #1 sheet, as it was when I uploaded the file, so only one sheet of vinyl is used per book.

I'd still need the heart printed on black vinyl, but that was an always plan for. The seal I'll have to figure out some other way, not too sure what I'm going to do with that. I don't have an embosser, but I could get one. But then IDK if you can emboss vinyl... eh, whater.

Then I went back to the book and glued on some spine supports. I did a layer of muslin, then some spare cardstock from the end papers in between the spine cord supports, and then another cloth over the top. I plan on making the cover separately and just gluing the pieces together, so I didn't make much effort to save the bumps on the spine made by the cords.

Not pictured, the cardstock and 2nd cloth layer. Because I guess I forgot to take a picture of them.

Then began the end pieces.

I have quite the experience sewing (girl of a thousand hobbies after all, making clothing is one of them), but the thread is so finiky, it loosens and escapes all on its own. The first few wraps took an act of god to get on.

Also, if you've noticed, the spine didn't appriciate me putting in the markers, and collapsed a bit. I don't know if thats' normal, but I can only assume it's not, and I shoved it a bit back into shape. #goodenough

I sat down at my couch and popped on a Critical Role episode, and wrapped. A few hours later, I didn't get much further--but it's noticeably better!

Got to this point, you can see the wraps are noticably tighter, and I got tired so decided to write this post as a break.

Welp, Monday is a work day, so back to the grindstone. Don't think my professors would appriciate me doing this during their lecture, so I'll leave it at home.

Onward!

[mistressdragonflame]

It is done!

I finally finished the bookpress, though I had to grind down the cross pipe to shorter so the shorter screw could reach a full extension.

I spent too long with my angle grinder trying to cut through before I realized I wasn't using the correct blade (a grinding blade, not a cutting blade), so it's shorter than needed. But whatever, IT IS DONE.

I then went to the next step and made some, I hope, wheat paste for the leather cover. It was rather thin, tbh, so I'm not sure if I trust it.

I'll try it out on something to see if it creates sticking at all.

I also then started to work again on the cricut designs. UGH, such a pain. I had to redraw the Vol. I, and change the font choices because the procreate image I made did not like importing. Then I continuously got the black box of death when uploading to Cricut design space, so that took a while too.

Finally finished it, and I'm printing a test copy out using some scrap vinyl. "Scrap" being a color I don't like and not the limited metalic I have.

Tomorrow I'm going to sew on some headbands. I got colors to match each volume (red and gold for the first, of course) and I think I'll be able to get them done easily. Time will tell.

On the homeward stretch!