I have a pouch on my adventure belt for a field observation notebook, but alas! none of my existing notebooks fit in my pouch. To remedy this I spent a snowy afternoon making myself a notebook to fit. I copied a wonderful technique from Meredith Scheff who blogged about it at Steampunk Workshop but did not include process photos. I took way too many process photos and have created a tutorial in the von_Hedwig Flickr photostream.
This is a great project to do with kids, even young kids, especially if you start with an existing notebook and cover it with this technique. I only had to buy one supply item, everything else came out of the recycling!
To cover a notebook you need:
clear gesso (art suppy shop, craft store – look in the painting aisle)
crumpled brown paper (paper grocery bags or shipping material)
watercolor paint
notebook
To make a notebook:
corrugated cardboard
paper
sturdy fabric scrap
stout needle
button thread
The tutorial shows the making of a notebook. If you want to cover an existing notebook, start here with h-glue paper to outside of notebook.
I’d suggest doing a set of step by step pics and then putting some of your projects up on instructables! They are really good and would be fun. I think even non-steampunkers would really enjoy them.