Mini Book in a Box - by Claudia

Servus, hi, salut and thank you so much for stopping by again! It is my turn today to share another (hopefully) inspirational project with you and this time I have followed my love for tiny projects and created a mini book that fits into a matchbox.

I have made my mini book a birthday calendar as I am one of those persons who constantly struggle with keeping track of others' birthdays and always start little notebooks with their birthday dates and then loose them (which actually means I am storing them in such special places that I never find them again *rollingeyes). So it may seem a bit odd to create an even tinier book for my birthday issues...but my hope is that my love for tiny treasures will help me in this case. lol

And just to give you a more precise idea on how tiny this book is:

It fits snugly with the matchbox - so the gorgeous Calico Craft Parts doors are the perfect size to create little books that can be put into matchboxes...which also makes them perfect little gifts, right?

Calico Craft Parts used:

- Sheet of Mini MDF Door Wood Shapes
- Sheet of Mini MDF Hinges Wood Shapes


And here's what I did:

I measured the doors for creating my accordeon fold pages and marked the width of the two needed strips on my cardstock.

Then I added dots of DecoArt Americana Butterscotch, Sea Glass, French Vanilla and Bleached Sand right from the bottles onto the paper...

...and scraped on the paints using an old plastic card.  The trick with this is to not overdo this step as the paints will start to mix too much and the lovely texture will get lost. But the good thing is: you can let it dry and always add another layer if needed until you are content with the look.

Once the paint had dried I cut the two strips to size and added some floral patterns through a stencil using brown archival stamping ink.

The strips were then folded and the edges of the pages inked with the brown stamping ink too. 

The two doors and hinges were given a base coat of DecoArt media fluid acrylic Raw Umber. 

Once that had dried I added tiny amounts of Vaseline here and there using an old small brush.

I painted on a mix of DecoArt media fluid  acrylics Titan Buff and Cobalt Teal Hue using a very soft brush (so not to smudge the Vaseline too much).

Once the paint was dry I wiped across the doors using a damp soft cloth thus taking off the paint that hadn't dried where the Vaseline had been added.

I finished off the doors by adding diluted Raw Umber and White DecoArt media Antiquing Creams.

Next I painted some DecoArt media fluid acrylic Metallic Gold on the hinges and door knobs...

...and toned them down with a wash of Raw Umber Antiquing Cream. 

Using an ultra fine tip black marker I added the months.

Before I glued the pages and door covers together (using matte Decou-Page) I dabbed on some more Metallic Gold around the book pages' edges to make them match the gold look of the hinges and door knobs.

Then I covered an old matchbox with another sheet of paper that I had done the same way as the book pages....

...and did some more handwriting on the box lid. 

Voilá!

I am sure these books would also look great in a doll's house or as mixed media jewellery pendants.  And of course they can be used for other notes than birthdays. Oh, I see endless possibilities for more mini door books here! ;) 

I hope you like my tiny project! 

Hugs and happy crafting,

Claudia

xxx