Confessions Of A Paper Addict

MY STORY
        Ok, I admit it.  I'm a Paper Addict...and  I know there are many of you out there like me.  Oh, I try to pretend by having every gadget known to man for high-tech note taking and synced calendars and appointment reminders.  However, there is still nothing as beautiful to me as the sound of a pen on paper.

      Like some of my friends hide new shoe purchases, I horde notebooks.  I have notebooks of every manufacturer and each of  them has a very specific purpose:  My Moleskine for sketching, my Rhodia for general note taking, my Levenger Circa notebook for my planner and a whole slew of lined, blank, graph, storyboard pages.....yes my problem is vast.

     Like the sweet enabler he is, my husband introduced me to a product with a cult following that I, shockingly, had never heard of.  Called The Traveler's Notebook by Midori, this little wonder is like a precious treasure.  First of all, the Japanese paper that comes with the notebook is beautiful and takes any type of ink with no bleed through.  And the beautiful, minimal yet functional packaging, is like a treat to open.
     And there are accessories you can purchase that can help you personalize your own Traveler's Notebook.  I had to get the graph paper and perforated sketchbook ones.  And charms, and bands and pen holders - Oh My!

     Along this journey I also discovered a great e-commerce site for my supplies.  Baum-kuchen is an amazing paper goods site and the owner, Wakako, sent me an email after placing my order asking me about myself, thanking me for my order and kept in touch with me until the moment my beautiful package arrived at my door!  Great site, check them out (www.baum-kuchen.net).

YOUR TURN

     Your new stationery adventure starts with the beautiful packaging and Japanese literature.  The Traveler's notebook comes in a heavy card stock envelope and then it is wrapped inside a lovely burlap bag (both of which I see incorporating into future crafting escapades).  My example is the dark brown full size Traveler's Notebook.  They also offer a passport size book.

 

 There is limited hardware and the simple leather notebook is  held together with a band.  It is beautiful as is, but the joy is in customizing it to suit your purposes.  To add notebooks (they recommend a maximum of two additional notebooks) you find the center of the supplied notebook and back that book up with one in the back and one in the front.  Find the center of those books and add your band.  If the following pictures don't do it justice, there are many blogs out there as well as YouTube videos.  I will post my favorite one at the end of today's entry.

Notice the YouTube tutorial playing in the background!

     I also changed the outer band with an orange one.  I  added the accessories of the pen holder and adhesive pockets - great for business cards, receipts and a larger pocket that has one end zipped and the other open.  Great for collecting scraps of memorabilia on your travels.  You just feed that piece underneath all the books.

     Just by starting to handle this, the leather is just gorgeous to the touch. I think of my artist friends -- this book is a journal waiting to happen.  Makes me want to be sitting in a Parisian cafe sketching the world as it goes by.

      YouTube tutorial from The Goulet Pen Company