weisserwatercolours

IT IS HEARTENING to read the comments lavished on me for this little project, and to see no one asking me ‘why bookmarks when we have Kindle Readers?’

heh heh….I do own one.  And I do have a Google Reader app loaded onto my cell phone. And yes, I do occasionally (like at the dentist’s) have need to continue reading the free download of the 19th C. contemporary of Charles Dickens, Wilkie Collins’ “The Guilty River” (a mystery).

And, because I didn’t want to undergo surgery for a crushed rib cage attempting to read the kazillion-page ‘War and Peace’ in bed, I did read that on my Kindle.

HOWEVER, reading ‘War and Peace’ on a Kindle, though less cumbersome, brings no satisfaction whatsoever when, many grey hairs later, one finishes it.  Why?  Because those kazillion pages simply vanish into thin air.  You don’t get the ego satisfaction of hefting the giant tome onto a bookshelf and nodding at it whenever going by, thinking, “I read that — the whole damn thing — every damn page of it.”

LIKEWISE,  young misses into the third week of dating a diehard Kindle devotee–invited to the apartment for coffee, waiting for it to be served–don’t get to peruse the bookshelves to get a good glimpse as to what this person is REALLY like.

THE CLINCHER FOR ME was when Kindle and Google started charging as much for their so-called cloud download of electronic nothingness, as a bookstore does for an actual, substantial, lap-filling, real-and-in-your-hands, BOOK.  Uh-uh.  If I’m gonna pay $20 for a book?  I WANT A BOOK.

THUS, the bookmark DIY project.  Because there are still alot of I-want-something-for-my-money book readers like me, who see Kindle as the garment of the Emperor.  So if a kindred spirit is going to have to pay $20+ regardless, not only do they want a real book, they’d enjoy receiving a bookmark gift to go with it.

So let’s finish it up…..

….the remains of the painting reject get chopped into pieces, the largest one measuring wider than 2 widths of the bookmark, because it is going to serve as a sleeve holder…..the smaller piece will become the gift giver’s  “To:/From:” tag

….the larger piece gets chopped down further, with the top part cut on the bias, and glue applied to the side and bottom edges.  This is then folded shut, and placed under a flat, heavy weight (I recommend ‘War and Peace’, snigger)….

….meanwhile, start your tassel by winding your choice of yarn(s) around the width of two fingers, thereby choosing how big or small you want the finished tassel to be….

…..thread the tassel loop through with a length of remaining yarn…..

….there are a few ways to handle the rest of this, and I prefer tying a simple knot and then adding a touch of glue to keep from having to knot it twice, thus making it too bulky-looking….

…..wrap a length of yarn below the knotted top to serve as the tassel’s ‘noose’, and secure that with another dab of glue, setting it all aside till the glue has soaked in and dried clear….

….the frayed ends are trimmed from the knot and the noosed yarn, then the looped bottom is sliced completely across to create the tassel…..

…..the gift sleeve is removed when dry and a complimentary-sized gift card/tag is glued to the front of it…..

….the completed bookmark, with tassel is inserted into the gift sleeve, accompanied (in this case) with a business card, ready for display and selling…