CAT FACE LEDGER REVIEW

What a fun project! If you missed this workshop, no worry as it was recorded and available to watch now. You will need the template and the written directions, so check the details in the newsletter. Many thanks go to Lara Cox for sharing her original design with us. When I first looked at the template with all the tiny dots for stitching holes I thought it would be almost impossible to stitch correctly, but Lara's patient instructions made it all work. Lara shared a website to help design stab bindings that she received from NORBAG member Caryn Lum. It looks like it could be a valuable site if you plan to design your own binding.

 https://nataliefreed.github.io/stab-bindings-designer/

Here are a few photographs of our Cat Face Ledgers

Michele Kamprath

Bonnie Julien

Margaret Beech

CAT FACE LEDGER

We will begin 2025 with a workshop to make a uniquely designed Japanese stab binding. Lara Cox will share her original design that features a cat's face in the stitching of the binding. Here is Lara's explanation of how she came up with this idea.

"I was inspired to create this stab binding pattern when I stumbled upon the work of two artists, Lori Forgues of Lbforgues Papercrafts and Becca of Becca Making Faces.

Both of these talented artists offer various Japanese Stab Binding tutorials online as well as encouraging you to go forth and make your own stab binding patterns. I like cats and after much brain twisting trial and error, I managed to make a cat face binding.

For this workshop we will be making a ledger shaped book with a single cat face binding. I will also touch upon how to make a double (or even multiple) cat face pattern for you to tackle in the future if you wish."

The "book" in this project is more like something that would be used to feature a poem or saying on a page rather than hold many pages. It would be an ideal gift for someone. Lara said "for the number of pages, I've done it this way because the binding is complicated enough as it is without folks having to struggle with lots of pages. During class I will have examples of this structure with more pages."

Materials:

Please have all the papers precut prior to the workshop. All papers (even for the covers) are 3" x 7" grain short.

• 2 pieces for the covers: cardstock, Mi-Teints, or similar weight decorative paper.
• 2 pieces for end papers: light weight decorative paper
• 2 pieces for the interior pages: text weight paper
• 8 feet of thread: embroidery thread or other of similar weight. Make sure your thread is a color that will stand out against your cover paper color so that the binding design will show up.

Tools:

• Sewing needle with a big enough eye for your chosen thread type
• Scissors
• Pencil
• Bone folder
• Ruler
• X-acto knife
• Bee's wax
• Awl
• 4 binder clips (1" size)
• Piece of foam core board or an old magazine. This is to place under your book when poking the holes for the binding.

You will be provided with the template for the binding pattern when you RSVP.

When?    Saturday, January 11 at 10 a.m. PST

Where?   On your computer, tablet or smartphone via Zoom

RSVP      To Dolores Guffey by January 6 to receive the password

Workshop Questions:  Lara Cox, lolastyle@hotmail.com

Zoom Questions:  Bobbie Hayes

Contact information is in the newsletter

HAPPY HOLIDAYS

 Thank you to our members Bobbie Hayes, Mary Conley, and Barbara Clark who organized and ran our very enjoyable Zoom meeting to share some of the holiday cards in this year's exchange. It was a wonderful way for the "out-of-towners" to share in the reveal of the cards. A shout-out also goes to Dolores Guffey and Sandy Vrem for organizing and hosting the local, in-person version of the exchange. The photographs of all of the cards in the exchange will be up on our Flickr account soon. Meanwhile, here is a peek of the very beautiful card by Catherine von Schwind.

Local members who attended the Holiday social were treated to a yummy spread of food as well as the reveal of all of the holiday cards in the exchange.

The cards are all ready to be gathered into bags
for each of the exchange participants.

From left to right, Donna Gephart, Michele Kamprath,
Kathy Warren, and Sandy Vrem.

YUM!

We wish everyone a happy, healthy, 

 creative season and new year!

DECEMBER MEETINGS

In December we will offer two opportunities for meetings. In lieu of a workshop at our usual 10 a.m. Zoom meeting, we will present the cards that are in this year's Holiday exchange. At noon we will have an in-person social gathering to distribute the cards in the Holiday exchange.

It has been five long years since we've gathered together for our holiday social. As in past years, Sandy Vrem has graciously opened her lovely home in Arcata for us to get together to share goodies, see the exchange cards, and have time to chat with each other. One does not need to have cards in the exchange to attend. We will have a short meeting to discuss our 2025 plans for the four in-person meetings we have scheduled for the 4th Saturdays in March, June, and September, plus the holiday social the 2nd Saturday of December. These meetings will be in addition to our regular 2nd Saturday Zoom workshops. We hope our local members will join us to share their input and suggestions.

Everyone can attend either the Zoom, in-person, or both of these events on Saturday December 14. The Zoom meeting is at our regular time of 10 a.m. PST and the in-person social will begin at noon PST. Please RSVP to receive the link to the Zoom and/or directions to Sandy's home.

Examples of past holiday cards

What:    Holiday Card Show & Tell

When & Where:  Saturday December 14 @ 10 a.m. PST on Zoom and/or in-person social in Arcata, California @ Noon PST

RSVP:   Dolores Guffey dguffey1@gmail.com by December 9 to receive the link for Zoom and/or directions to Sandy Vrem's home.

CHRISTMAS TREES

Many thanks to our two international M's...Mary Conley from Victoria, British Columbia, Canada and Margaret Beech from York, England. They came up with a terrific workshop to start off the holiday season. Mary showed us how to make a simple origami inspired Christmas Tree that was all about folding...no glue and no sewing. It could be made in any size using a square sheet of paper. Here are some examples:

Dolores Guffey used her beautiful
marbled paper.

Ellen Hoffman made this little tree
 (paper 5 1/4" square) to be hung
from her Christmas tree.

Michele Kamprath made her tree
from map paper.

Margaret's tree was made from four different sized squares of paper and could be expanded to have even more layers. This tree did require a bit of gluing, but it could also be dismantled and flattened to send or pack away for another year. Here are some examples: 

Margaret's four cone shapes ready to be stacked.

Margaret's finished tree

Michele Kamprath's tree made from 
map and music papers.

Dolores Guffey's tree

Bonnie Julien's trees

Sherrill Story's two trees

Sherrill modified her tree structure
 to turn it into flat cards.

This same "tree" structure can also be used to make a Santa Claus or maybe something else. Here is a photo of one Margaret made from recycled holiday cards. 

Thank you to everyone who participated in the workshop... especially Mary and Margaret for teaching us how to make these structures.

3-D TREES

NORBAG is very lucky to have many talented members to teach us new structures. Our November workshop will be a collaboration between Mary Conley and Margaret Beech. Mary will demonstrate an origami sculpture of a tree using a single square piece of paper.

Mary's tree

With just squares of light card or heavyweight paper Margaret will show us how to make a Christmas tree that "grows" and can be collapsed to store to be part of your holiday decorations year after year. 

Margaret's tree

Materials List

Mary's Tree:

• One large (12 inches or more) square of thin paper. Mary uses Taro's Origami paper from Amazon, which is 13.8 inches square. Thin wrapping paper would do as long as it folds easily.
• Bone folder
• pencil
• ruler
• Xacto knife or box cutter
• A separate piece of white paper on which to draw a template

Margaret's Tree:

• The following sizes of squares should all be cut from medium weight cardstock or heavy weight paper. Margaret suggests using differing shades of green for a festive theme.
• Three 6 inch squares
• Three 5 inch squares
• Three 4 inch squares
• Three 3 inch squares
• The same tools as for Mary's tree with the addition of paper clips and a glue stick

When:   Saturday November 9 at 10 a.m. PST

Where:  On your computer, tablet or smartphone via Zoom

RSVP:    Dolores Guffey by Nov. 4 to receive the password

Workshop Questions:  Mary Conley - sculptsster@gmail.com

Margaret Beech - beeches1313@gmail.com

Zoom Questions: Bobbie Hayes

Contact information is in the newsletter

BOOK EXCHANGES

 On October 6th, PSBA (Puget Sound Book Artists) held their sixth annual book exchange. It is somewhat modeled after NORBAG book exchanges except that there is only one exchange a year. This year the theme was "Threads" and 23 members participated. Shown below is a sample of some of the beautiful books that were exchanged.

Abbie Birmingham

Debbi Commodore

Jan Ward

Lynn McClain

Esther Ervin

Janet Reynolds

Bonnie Julien

Lynn Skordal

Elsi Vassdal Ellis

Mari Eckstein Gower

Kim Izenman

Dorothy McQuistion

Lynne Olson

Belinda Hill

Sally Alger

Kat Gower

Becky Frehse

Lisa Leong Tsang