Even though I started my holidays on Monday, I’ve been very busy this week. No, I haven’t prepared my GUADEC talk yet. I haven’t really had time, since I spent quite a lot of hours designing the GUADEC booklet (thanks for gathering all the info, Deborah!) and badge.
We’re flying to Amsterdam tomorrow, so we should start packaging our stuff… Among my stuff, there’s something very useful:
Tada! A multi-purpose recycled notebook. For those of us who don’t have a fancy iPhone, Nexus, Nokia, etc. this is great! I made one for a trip last year and I was so pleased with the result that I decided to make one this time as well. So I took a few reused items, put them together, a little glue here and there, and voila! 🙂 It even has a pocket inside, so I can conveniently and safely carry my ID card + transport card + some money in my pocket, and look up the timetables I have previously written in it. Yeah I know, I can’t sync it with Tomboy, but I can practice my handwriting, which I rarely do!
I used:
- a cereal box (some organic muesli boxes have a very beautiful design, and yes, I admit that the first time I bought this brand was because I loved the packaging and knew it would serve another purpose)
- a gnome sticker from GUADEC 2007
- unused sheets of paper from an old notebook (for this notebook, I didn’t use sheets of paper written on one of the sides because I want it to be as compact as possible, so I want to be able to write on both sides of paper)
- a little piece of Velcro
- 1 staple
Instructions (more or less):
1. Use the cereal box to make the cover. If it is beautiful, you can use the outside. Otherwise, just use the inside, which is usually white, and, if you want, you can decorate it afterwards. My cover measures 10.5 x 13.5 cm (h x w). Fold it in half and there you go! You have a cover.
2. Now for the inside. Take a few reused sheets of paper (I recommend to use unused sheets of paper from an old notebook for this particular type of notebook) and cut them. They should be a little bit smaller than the cover (mine measure 10 x 12.5 cm). Then fold them in half.
3. Cut the pocket out of the cereal box too: 10.5 x 6 cm. For the bottom of the pocket, take a piece of paper, around 2 x 9 cm, and fold it in half. Then glue one of the halves to the inner cover and the other side to the pocket (in the picture below, the red cardboard).
4. For the sides of the pocket, take a small piece of paper, around 4 cm wide, and fold it in zig-zag (“accordion-like”) in 4 parts. Glue one of the parts to the top side of the inner cover and the other one -that would be part 1 and part 4- to the top side of the pocket. Then do the same for the other side of the pocket.
5. Assemble the whole thing, staple it in the middle, decorate the cover as you like and you’re done!
6. If you don’t want it to open so easily, take a little piece of Velcro and glue one of the sides to the front cover. Cut a small rectangle out of a paper or (thin) cardboard rectangle, fold it in half (length-wise) and glue the other side of the Velcro to one of the halves. Then glue the other half to the back cover (Velcro inside!).
Done! Slip your credit card, money or anything else into the pocket, write your flight/bus timetables or other useful info and you’re ready to go!
I’m NOT ready to go, so I’d better start packaging my stuff… See you in a few days!