My little girl LOVES nature- and we cannot take a walk to the corner without picking up leaves, seeds, and flowers to press. Since I reviewed the Cinch binding tool, I decided to make her a special nature journal so she can collect her treasures & keep them safe.

You need:

• The Cinch book binding tool and binding wires (I used 1 inch wires) OR a 1/4 hole punch
• 4 paper lunch sacks
• 6X9 f Foamie sheets, in your choice of colors.You need two for the covers.
• Foamie Stickers- alphabets, flowers, leaves, or a theme of your child’s choice!
• Wire cutters for cutting wire OR some yarn to lace up the binding

First, prepare the lunch bags. Find the crease at the bottom of the bag where it folds over. Cut on that line, removing the bottom of the bag.

Fold the bag in half. This is one register, or two pages of your journal. Each will be like a pocket! Repeat 4 times to make an 8-page journal. Then, working 2 registers at a time, punch holes in them using the Cinch. I centered it in the Cinch, and used the center 10 pins:

Once your pages are prepared, you’ll make a cover. Simply trim the Foamie sheets until they are 6X6 inches, using scissors.Using the same settings as the pages, punch the covers one at a time.

(If you are using a hole punch, make a template so that you can punch each page the same. Then hand-punch your holes.)

Now you are ready to bind! If you are uUsing wire cutters, cut your binding wire so that it has 10 loops:

Then place the wire on the loops on the side of the Cinch:

Load your pages onto your loops first, then follow up with the covers. Remove the binding wire carefully and move it to the back of the machine. Place it beneath the pink bar, set the knob to 1 inch (or the size of the wires you’re using) and then press down on the handle.

The wires will compress, making a perfect binding. Flip one of the covers over to the front, and voila! You’ve got a book.

Now your child is ready to embellish the cover (or inside pages) with the foamie stickers. My little girl put all kinds of them on the cover, and is tucking leaves into the insides of the pages. This would also be fun for scout troops,  travel journals, or even Letterboxing books! And because you are using paper sacks for the pages, it’s super-economical.

OH! And remember those bottoms we trimmed off the bags? Well, they make great little trash trays for your studio table to catch little scraps in!

Have fun and happy crafting!

Disclosure: This post originally ran on CraftsUnleashed – I’m a member of their design team. I received the products with the included links from ConsumerCrafts.com.

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Chief Craft Test Dummy, Craft Evangelist, Founder, Editor, bottle-washer, trouble-maker, and creative whirlwind.

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