My Crafty Friends, Please Help Me!

I am about to share something deeply personal with you my crafty friends. I am an Iraq War widow. My first husband, Sgt. Daniel Woodcock, was killed in Iraq March 11, 2007.

The reason I am sharing this with you is that the 3 year anniversary of his death is steadily approaching and I have been feeling this enormous sense that I need to do something to commemorate it. Then last month a good friend's husband was killed in Afghanistan and it became clear. I need to help comfort these women.

The reason this blog is called "I Make Stuff" is that making stuff is my reaction to the world around me. When my friends are sick, having a baby, or just having a hard time I Make Stuff. When I am feeling the grief particularly strongly, I Make Stuff. It makes me feel as if I have some control. This year instead of spending the day with my heart in the fetal position, I want to make stuff. Not only do I want to make stuff but I want to SEND stuff.

I am starting what I'd like to call the Write It Out Project, handmade journals for grieving military widows. I read somewhere (and now I CANNOT find it!) that people who journal through times of grief are less likely to need depression medications as people who don't. I know that I found it extremely helpful.

So, to make a very long story short, I am posting this tutorial and asking my crafty friends a favor. Would you be willing to make one of these for a military widow? Composition notebooks only cost a dollar and I bet you have all of the other materials in your stash.

Write It Out Project Journal Tutorial

What you need:

Composition notebook

two coordinating fabrics

ribbon

button

craft paper and mod podge, if desired

Composition notebooks sometimes have ugly tables and schedule stuff printed on the inside of the cover. If you like you can take some pretty paper and mod podge it on the inside cover.

Then you will cut out two rectangles of fabric, 25inX13.5in. Pin them together, right sides facing, and sew all the way around, leaving a 3 inch opening. Turn it right side out and press. You should now have this:

Topstitch all the way around. Now fold the top and bottom down 1 inch, press and pin.

Topstitch this down (or just sew as close to the edge as you can). Now lay the composition book on top of it and figure out where you want the folds to go.

Press and pin it in place and topstitch it closed. The front should fold over about 2 inches and the back should fold over almost all the way to the spine.

Next you sew on the button! Be careful not to sew through your newly created pocket. Then get your ribbon and wrap it around the button like so:

Here is the back:

Cut the ribbon so that when overlapped on the back it is directly in the middle of your cover. Heat seal the edges and pin in place. Make sure you don't pin through your back pocket! Sew a box and then zig zag in the middle (I would normally do that with matching thread but I used brown so you can see it better.)

Woo Hoo! You're DONE!

If you make one of these please contact me at alidanicolelee@gmail.com and I will tell you what to do next. Thank you so much my crafty friends! This will be a wonderful project!