Creating a paper bag book

 While I am normally getting ready to sleep around 6:00 am,  today I must be up and out the door early for my trip out of town to the Cosmosphere.  I will take photos, but I probably won't show them until after bEARTHday.  So I'll be late visiting and may not even make it around at all today.

Some of you may remember my friend Kathy gave me a bunch of paper bags she had marked and punched holes in.  I planned to create that book.  If not, I would more than likely have sent these bags to the recycle center.

The first thing I did was paint one bag green so it would be different.  It is the inner most bag.  Other materials include my "needle," which is a dental flosser, and waxed thread.

Then I cut about five times longer than I would need and tried to insert the waxed thread into the first hole.

That didn't work.  I had to retrieve my awl and make the holes larger.

Note any time you see the brown paper, you are looking at the outside.

The green side is the inside.

Now I spent hours and hours, not just creating this pamphlet stitch, I also spent hours photographing it.  In the end, I think you can see how it's made, but the image I found on the internet at the end of the post is far better than my photos.

This convoluted demonstration boils down to: in one hole, out the next, back in the first hole, out the next.

I stopped trying to describe everything as soon as I found the diagram at the bottom of this post.

I left long tails at both ends, because I planned to add beads and charms.

Here is a diagram I found on the internet: 

Maybe it will clarify what I did.  It looks a lot better than the way I photographed my pamphlet stitch.

I left the tails long because I wanted to add beads.
 
Unfortunately, many of the beads I chose because of their colors, had holes too small for the wax thread to fit into.

Right now I'm not sure where I'm going with this.  I hope when Kathy comes down later this month, she will give me pointers on how to finish it off.

Today is Day 15 of 22 and I recycled eight paper lunch bags and some beads into a paper bag book.  Thank you, as always for your continued support of my recycling efforts.  Hope to see you later today, but if not, tomorrow.