WOYWW #415 Cleaning + Altered Book Breaktimes

This book that I've slowly (10 years now!) been altering needs some love.

To join in this week's WOYWW, you can hop on over to Julia Dunnit's Stamping Ground where there is a Linky tool that allows her guests to join her weekly workdesk events. 

I really like this book for altering. It's fairly good sized, has a sewn binding and sturdy plain black covers, front and back. The spine seems a bit weak, but that can always be remedied, of course.  
:)

Here's a sneak peek at a few of the details. I've only recently added some gesso to one page, overtop of which went soft lavendar with mooshed in streaks of gold Perfect Pearl Powder. The splatters are of Mod Podge original formula with some copper Perfect Pearl blended in. More on that later.

Some of you know that I've really got too small a creative space nowadays for much storage. This means keeping things as simple as I can. I live life on a budget too, so anything that I might choose to buy I'd need to think about first like this: 1) Where do I put the thing? And 2) Would it be useful in enough ways to make storing it the thing to do?

The next photo shows some of what I've been working on this past week. The clutter is all about tidying up following clearing my Mini Mister set of that messy residual pigment. The zipper bags are waiting for their new home. 

Mini mister cleaning is...well...fairly messy! That turned out to be a bit of a tough and long project in and of itself. You see, using anything gooey such as thinned paint or (as I did) acrylic ink, with a Mini Mister is bound to clog and/or collect inside of the tiny parts that you can see but that nobody could reach without breaking into them. This led me to experimenting using the leftover liquid from a canister of Clorox Wipes for soaking. (No bleach in that formula, so please don't worry)

The first step, of course, was to break everything down into the separate parts. I even removed the little interior ring from inside the mouth of each container. Everything then got a nice, leisurely soak in the leftover Clorox wipe cleaning solution. I actually forgot that I'd left things that way for a few months, I've been so busy with other things.

I followed that step by rinsing everything well, wiping out residue using a corkscrew of paper toweling (that softer kind called Viva) I next filled each one with enough water to use for a spritzing final rinse. This worked! One benefit was a soft pink sprayed blur on some scrap paper that I may use someday. They may not look brand new, but they do look a lot cleaner. It's a cleaning tip...sort of. Lolz

:)

Now back to that book altering project! The 2 pager being added to on its left hand page.

And now for something else to do with my cleaning and reorganizing project. I like good quality PVA whenever I bind books that require some gluing, don't you? This bottle I've managed to keep now for years. And years. Long time. You see, I generally use stitching and folding techniques most of the time for the making of books nowadays. I sometimes need to rest my hands, and gluing in bookbinding can be very unforgiving if one cannot remain busy for long enough to make sure that everything comes out smoothly. That's how come there's still so much of it that remains still inside this bottle!

Hahaha!! It had a "hat" on when I removed the cap! Apparently, some of it had splashed to the top of the inside of the applicator tip when I was moving to where I now reside, where it dried, forming that funny looking "hat." I simply had to take a picture of it before removing that hat. I hope you can appreciate my strange sense of humor!

:)

The part which I think really has kept that old bottle so fresh was how I made certain to keep its tiny red cap snapped into place on the applicator tip along with placing the whole kit and kaboodle inside of a zipper bag. This last I always "burped" any excess air from just prior to closing. The final step was to wind a slender rubber band very tightly around the tip, bundling the plastic of the bag in place at the same time. For ten whole years, this has worked!

But then, perhaps that accidental and funny looking little "hat" has helped a bit too. Who knew that glue could help me out in such a funny way?

:)

See you all later today and Happy WOYWW!

Rose