DIY Leather Notebook

Ahhh the smell of a leather project in the morning. It just does a girl good, am I right?

I have whole heartedly loved getting to know my Cricut Explore. That thing just knocks my socks off every time I get a harebrained project idea.

Do you ever see projects on Pinterest, and on blogs that you LOVE but don’t actually want to do the work involved in creating? Did you know that only a very small percentage of people who consider themselves crafters actually like to come up with the ideas? The vast majority just want to follow the instructions and have it turn out exactly like the picture.

Your creative lives are about to become 79% more simple. Cricut came up with this amazing idea called Make It Now. Basically they have designers (like yours truly) create fool proof projects that you can make with a click. ONE. CLICK. Everything is designed and laid out, all you do is load the materials into your Explore and press Go.

Of course I had to start off my Cricut marriage with Leather. Because leather it is my Spirit Animal.

You do need a Cricut Explore to make these projects,  GREAT news! They just lowered the price from $299 to $249!! So get on it girl!!

First things first, head over a and pick your favorite design (there are just so many cute ones!)

When you click the file it will take you to Design Space. All you have to do is click the little green button at the bottom of the window that says Make It Now.

That will open up the files.

Click Purchase and Go. Once you buy the files, they are now yours. So if you want to add your own image to the notebook template you can. Or if you want to make another one of the notebooks that I designed you would just have to purchase the single image that is drawn, not the entire template again!

 

Each mat represents a different material. The first mat is the leather cover. The Explore will start by drawing the image

Then it will cut the cover out.

Your second mat is a piece of colored cardstock.

The remaining mats are the notebook pages.

Remember when you are taking paper off your mat to peel the mat off of the paper, not the other way around, or you will end up with a curl-fest. (This tip was one of the hacks I talked about here)

Now it is time to assemble!

 

Start by folding your colored cardstock in 1/2 and placing the white pages inside.

 

Add the leather cover and make sure your holes are lining up. (If your leather is really stiff you might need to crease it to break the fold. Rolling pins work super good!)

Wrap leather cording or masonry line through the holes a few times

 

Then knot it.

So simple right?!!

Now, a word about the leather. The stiffer your leather the better the markers will write. I have only had this project go south once and the leather was suede,  super thin and had ZERO structure to it. Couch leather works perfectly,  stiff leather works even better.

Here are just a few of my favorite designs,

 

There are SO many more,  check out all of the Vintage Revivals Cricut projects HERE.

If you are thinking about buying a Cricut Explore, let me be the first to tell you, that it is an AWESOME idea. I love mine so so much, and there are so many cool projects coming down the pipeline, I don’t want you to miss out!

Have the best Monday my loves!