Dr. Who TARDIS mini Journal and necklace

I can't wait for the new Dr. Who to start up this month, it's one of my favorite television series! I'm going to miss Matt Smith, but I'm excited to see what Peter Capaldi will bring to the role.  I wanted to do a Dr. Who craft for the blog, but I wasn't quite sure what I was going to do, until I went cavorting on my one of favorite craft inspiration sites, YouTube.  I stumbled across some book making tutorials and because I'm a little nuts, I thought it'd be a lot of fun to do a miniature of River Song's TARDIS journal.

I wasn't satisfied with the tutorials I found.  The crafters did a fine job with their materials and came up with some great journals, but they didn't look like the stills from the show.  They'd glued
something, usually card stock or cardboard on the top of their existing journals, which gave very sharp edges to the journal, however the prop makers seemed to have embossed the leather instead. I wanted something that looked closer to the prop, so I went looking for a material that I'd be able to work with that wouldn't cost me a ton of money.  I had some craft foam left over from a previous project and so I decided I'd give it a shot.  I think it looks a little more like leather than some of the examples I saw.  Of course, after painting, mine's not an exact copy of the journal from the show, either, but distressed items rarely look the same.

I wanted to make a necklace after seeing some of Jill Weisman's beading tutorials on YouTube, so this was a perfect opportunity to combine them both into one very stunning necklace.

Oh, and NEWS!  I have an Etsy shop now where you can find all of my crafty goodness for sale.  Most of the items listed there will be one-of-a-kind items all inspired from the blog.  You can find the pieces at the shop tab up at the top, too.  It'll take you to Etsy to purchase.  Go check it out!  I'll be here when you return, I promise.  :)

Materials

(Journal)

Paper (I'm using printer paper)

Tea bags or instant coffee

Something to poke small holes with: a small drill or awl

Needle

Thread

cardboard

craft foam

Paint: Blue, purple, and white or pale blue

Brushes for paint

craft knife

Scissors

Jump ring (9mm)

Clothespins or binder clips

Glue (I'm using white glue, but any glue will do the trick)

Dotting tools or bobby pin, toothpick or pen

(Necklace)

Beads (I'm using 6 mm glass) in blue, silver, and clear

Beading Needle

Beading Thread

Chain

Lobster Clasp

Round-nosed pliers, wire cutters, Flat nosed pliers

Phwew!  Lots of stuff.  Fortunately, most of these things are easily found around the house.  If you don't have and don't want to get beading needle and thread, use a thicker thread and a fine needle and larger beads.  The 6 mm won't be a problem but if you're using finer beads, you'll want a finer needle.

The Pages of the journal

Since I wanted an older look to the piece, I dyed the journal pages with tea before putting them together.  The process couldn't be simpler: brew tea, dip paper into tea, and let dry.  Crumple the paper for more texture.  If you want a deeper color, let the paper soak for longer.  I waited about 1-3 minutes for my pages.  They'll be pretty delicate and very prone to ripping, so be careful when taking them out.  The tears, however can be useful, so don't lose heart if you end up tearing a page or two.  I let my pages dry overnight.

Confession time:  I cannot draw a perfectly vertical or horizontal line to save my life, even with a ruler and with guide lines.  Instead, I folded the paper in order to get a good line, paying close attention to the corners and edges.  If they're even, so's my line.  I use this as my guide for cutting the pages into strips around 2 inches high.  Once I'm covered in 2 inch by 8 inch strips, I folded them in half and tore along that line to make the pages of the journal.  I gave the 2x4 strips another sharp fold in the middle and then ran a craft knife lightly around the edges to rough them up.  It's still not a big deal if there's a big slice out of a page, because the actual journal is in terrible condition.

Grab a handful of pages and line up the folds.  10 seems to work well and I wouldn't go past 20.  Even them out, put them in the binder clip or a few clothespins  and poke a small hole through all the sheets near the fold.  I found 3 holds well for this size.  

I ran my needle and thread through the holes in a figure 8 pattern: top hole, middle, bottom, middle and tied off the thread.  I put a bit of duct tape to act as the tape binding for the book.  Trim off the excess tape and put the pages aside. 

The Cover

I plotted out the cover on a separate piece of paper, folding to get nice and straight lines before plotting them with the pencil.  This became my template for the outside of the cover.  Once I had the design for the outside, I cut a piece of poster board and a larger piece of craft foam that would overlap onto the back of the poster board.  I placed my template down on my poster board, marked where the spine was going to be and lightly scored it with the craft knife before folding it.  The score marks will always be on the outside.  Do the same to the larger piece of the craft foam and spread a thin layer of glue along the cardboard, place approximately n the middle, and let dry completely.

Once dry, use the spine score marks as your guide to cut all the way to the cardboard.  Do not cut the board.  I had to cut a slight angle to keep the edges from overlapping on the spine strip.  Next, cut the corners of the craft foam, fold over, and glue to the underside.  I used clothespins to hold the craft foam to the cardboard to help keep its shape.  Since the craft foam mars easily, use a bit of cloth or cotton pad to keep the clothespins or binder clip from ruining the craft foam.  Let dry for at least 10 minutes before removing them and let them continue to dry.

Once everything's dry, I turned the cover over.  Using the lines from my template and a ruler to make sure everything was as even as I could make it, I lightly drew where I'd be embossing the craft foam, starting with the two horizontal lines at the top and bottom of the book since they cross the entire cover.  I placed the horizontal lines and then finally drew in the panes of the police box before tracing over all of my lines using a nail art dotting tool.  If you're not into nail art, a pen, toothpick, or any rounded end of an object will do.  I gently traced over my lines before increasing the pressure and decreasing the size of my tool for a more precise line.  Don't cut all the way through the craft foam, but make the lines very deep.   I still had to go over them at various stages during the painting as well.   Once I had all my lines, I poked a hole in the spine to attach a jump ring to later.  I did this now so that I could paint inside the hole since the Tardis is blue and my foam is Not Blue.

Painting

I used acrylic paint I had lying around and mixed a bright blue with a little bit of purple, watered it down until it was about the consistency of milk, and painted over everything red. This took about 3 coats to get a nice, consistent blue color over the entire piece.  The paint, naturally, filled the lines I made earlier and so after the piece dried, I went back and gently deepened the lines with a fine dotting tool.  I did this after every coat to the places that needed it.

I then worked on the aging by adding a thick purple to the recessed areas and a light blue to the higher areas, going over with the original color when things seemed to get a little out of hand as they do sometimes when you paint.  Once dry, I put the jump ring in and applied Mod Podge to protect my work. Here's the finished piece:

Oooh, SHINY!

Jill Weisman has a great tutorial on making a beaded spiral necklace that I originally intended to make as the entire piece, but I began to get paranoid that I did not have enough blue and clear beads.  Instead, I made about 6 1/2 inches of chain, bound it off, added jump rings, and attached it to a bit of chain, where I added some beads just to ease the change from beaded chain to actual chain.  I topped it off with a lobster clasp and fell in love.  I think the piece is beautiful, but I may be a little biased.  :)