Stephanie and I have been pinning up a storm on Pinterest, gathering ideas for a Harry Potter Christmas tree. She wants one. I want one. We've wanted one for years, and are finally lighting a fire under our cauldrons to gather and craft as many Harry Potter themed holiday ornaments and decor as we can.
Project number one: Miniature Harry Potter Book Ornaments. There are already a lot of miniature book tutorials out there. Some of them use a solid material on the inside, such as balsa wood, craft foam, or foam core. Some of them use air-dry clay or baked polymer clay.
We really wanted our books to have real paper pages, but the thought of cutting hundreds of strips of small paper rectangles didn't sound like fun. Even with a few paper cutters it would be a chore. But where could we find a good pre-cut option in the right size?
My almost-brilliant revelation: MINI STICKY NOTES.
This was one of those moments I thought, "OH HOW CLEVER I AM!" Then I tried to find WHITE miniature sticky notes. Who knew these were unicorns in the world of sticky notes?!
Post-It brand makes white sticky notes in the 3x3 size, and also some larger pads with lines or grids on them. You can also find 3x3 white paper cubes. Anything smaller almost doesn't exist.
Almost.
Finally I stumbled across these on Amazon. Amazon has everything. Why didn't I just search there first?
TreeFrog makes 2" x 1.5" white sticky notes. They are made from sugar cane, so they are eco friendly. I didn't know that was a thing, but I'm all for saving trees. Some reviewers said that some types of ink smeared on the paper, but I wasn't planning on writing on them, so that wasn't a problem.
At $10.75 per box of 12, it seemed a little pricey, but I was hoping to get at least two full sets of miniature books out of the box. Just over 5 bucks each for a set of miniature book pages seemed A-okay to me.
Ensue more self-congratulatory patting on the back. Thanks to my Amazon Prime membership, the sticky notes came in just two days. Stephanie came over and we set to work on what we thought would be a relatively fast and easy craft project.
Haha. Hahahahahaha! It took us THREE HOURS. Oy!
Before you start, you will need:
White miniature sticky notes. I used these.
High quality lightweight card stock or matte coated photo paper. I used this.
Cardboard cereal box
Paper cutter. I like Fiskars because you can buy replacement blades.
Colored adhesive vinyl (or colored paper w/ a glue stick)
Tacky Glue
Jewelry eyepins (any craft store)
Metallic ribbon or cording
Optional: clear packing tape to laminate book jackets
Step 1: Design the book jackets. I have already done the design work for you. Wasn't that nice of me? I spent many many hours doing this. I couldn't find any printable covers that were as nice as I wanted them, so I made my own.
DISCLAIMER: These images are copyrighted intellectual property belonging to the artist Mary GrandPré, J.K. Rowling, and Scholastic. These printables should be used for PERSONAL PROJECTS ONLY. It is illegal to sell items with this artwork on them. So, please don't do that.
Other sizes: The link above includes miniature 1-inch book covers, which would be great for little charms, 2-inch book covers, just to fit them all on one page, and also the exact size that I used, which is about 2 1/8 inches. Below are direct links to the exact files I created and used for this tutorial.
I found the book jacket artwork on Harry Potter Wiki. The image resolution was decent. Not good enough to print full sized, but I knew I was going to shrink them down, so they did not need to be full sized high resolution. They were the original cover art of the US editions by Mary GrandPré. Unfortunately, they didn't have any of the cover text that is printed and embossed during production.
I've noticed some crafters using these images as-is, adding only cover title text, so their miniature books don't have text on the front, or spine, or anywhere else. I even saw a listing on a marketplace site where the crafter didn't bother to add "Harry Potter" to the cover, they just used the naked cover artwork.
What?! That's no bueno!
So I grabbed my own hardcover copies of the books and spent about a few hours re-creating the book covers. I adjusted image color and contrast, resized, added cover text, spine text, spine graphics, back cover text, and even tiny bar codes and ISBN numbers. The only thing I didn't add was inside jacket flap text. I hope you will forgive me on that account. The text would have been too tiny to read, and no one will see the insides of the jacket flaps anyway.
Each book jacket image is 2 1/8 inch tall, just a smidge larger than the 2-inch tall sticky notes I used for my inner pages.
Step two: Print the book jackets. I used an inkjet printer, and printed the covers on Epson Premium Presentation Paper Matte. I love this paper because it has a bright white coating on one side that displays vibrant color. Simply gorgeous.
You could use standard copy paper or lightweight card stock, but these types of paper are very porous and the images will look dull. A coated paper is going to give you the best results.
I do not recommend a glossy photo paper simply because the real book jackets aren't glossy, glossy shows fingerprints, and is also harder to fold. Any coated matte paper of photo or presentation quality will work. Epson, Canon, HP, Red River Paper ... whatever you can find for a good price. You could also take the files to a print shop rather than buy a whole package of high quality paper. I will say, however, that if you are a frequent crafter, a package of quality coated printer paper is a sound investment.
NOTE: If you have a laser printer, be sure to use paper specifically for laser printing. Laser prints or copies will have a semi-glossy sheen, as is the nature of that type of toner.
Step three: Trim apart the printed book jackets. A paper cutter is best for precision here. I use this one made by Fiskars. It might seem a little pricey, but it will cut papers up to 12 inches wide, and you can buy replacement blades for it, a 2-pack for around $5.00. Amazon has them, and I have also found blades at Michael's and Hobby Lobby.
Best thing about this cutter: I love that this cutter has a wire guide to show me exactly where my cut is going to be. It's not always precise down to the millimeter, but it's pretty darn close. Everyone who has been crafting with me and has used my cutter has commented on that awesome wire guide.
OPTIONAL: You could choose to laminate your book jackets with clear contact paper, or clear packing tape, for extra durability. I skipped this step.
Step four: Cut your sticky notes. Yeah, that's what I said. You're going to have to cut them. I'm sorry!
This was the first issue we came up against: The sticky notes are too wide. At 2-inches tall there were the perfect height, but proportionally too wide for the Harry Potter book covers. Blah.
If you are not a stickler for details, you can leave the sticky notes as-is. The title wont be perfectly centered, and some of the artwork that should wrap around the inside flap will be on the front. If you're not bothered by that, you can skip the cutting and move on to Step 5.
For me, cutting tiny paper rectangles was going to happen no matter what. The dilemma was how best to cut them. My X-Acto knife was dull. I couldn't find any box cutters or razor blades in the garage (the topic of how disorganized the Husband Unit keeps the toolbox is much debated in our house). No one wanted to go out and buy more blades. It was really freaking cold outside. So we cut them all in small stacks with my paper cutter. Or I should say that Stephanie cut them all. Can we all just take a moment and cheer for Stephanie who cut all 12 of those mini sticky note pads? YAY STEPHANIE!
She used one of my paper cutters mentioned above, using a piece of washi tape to mask of a guide on the cutter so the pages were mostly uniform in size. The height was good at 2 inches tall, and we determined that the width needed to be about 1 and 3/16" or 1.1875.
Steph cut all 12 pads of sticky notes by peeling away and cutting small stacks of maybe 8 sheets each. It wasn't an exact science, just however many pages the cutter could manage at one time and still cut cleanly. Then she stacked up the sheets again, lining up the sticky edge. Due to tiny variances in the cut width, the finished stacks have the look of deckle edge books.
Meanwhile, I worked on crafting the book covers.
Step 5: Hard Book Covers. You could just wrap your printed book jackets around your stacks of paper, glue them, and call it a day. We really wanted our books to look real, so we made little hard covers for the book jackets to wrap around. This is a tedious process, but not difficult.
For this step you will need some thin cardboard, such as from a cereal box, and a material to cover them, such as thin paper and glue or adhesive vinyl. I used Oracal adhesive vinyl, but you can use whatever you'd like.
Step 5-A: Cut cardboard cover pieces: For each miniature hard cover, you're going to need 3 pieces: 1 each for the front and back covers, and 1 narrow piece for the spine. I recommend cutting all of your covers and spines at the same time. This will make assembly of the books faster later.
Cover dimensions: 2.125" x 1.375" (2 1/8 x 1 3/8)
Spine dimensions: 2.125" HIGH, varied widths
Height: Since the sticky notes are 2 inches in height, the covers need to be a bit larger. I cut them around 2 1/8 in height, or 2.125". I used washi tape to mark a guide on my cutter deck, then cut several long strips from my box cardboard at roughly 2 1/8" tall. From there I taped off a new guide and cut the strips in widths of 1 3/8" -- we were making 2 sets of books, so I needed 28 cover pieces. If you're making one set of books, you'll only need 14 cover pieces.
Spines: Here's where a bit of obsessive compulsiveness comes out in me. Of all the miniature Harry Potter books I've seen, one thing bothered me about them. They were all the same thickness. Some crafters have created mini books for American Girl dolls. Some have created ornaments. Some have made mini book charms for jewelry. One commonality among them all are uniform book thickness. To create the most realistic miniature books possible, the books can not all be the same thickness.
In order to create visually accurate miniature versions of the series, the spines can not all be the same size. From my close examination of the cover art during the hours I spent working on perfecting my mini book jackets, I don't understand how other crafters have managed to create books of uniform width and thickness. They either had to crop or cut the artwork off somewhere, or the artwork lined up in the wrong places along the spine and back. I haven't found any listings or tutorials that show the back of the mini books, so I have no idea what they did back there.
So, that's my pet peeve. The spines need to be somewhat proportional in width to the full sized version so the books. You may be less particular, and that's okay!
Spine measurements: The height of the spine pieces are the same as the book covers. I didn't write down measurements as I cut the spines, I just got out my ruler and measured the spine area of each book jacket I had already printed, and cut two spine pieces per book (remember we were making two sets). If you're making one set of books, just cut one spine piece for each book. You can also just eyeball the width of the spine area on the book jackets.
I love this little metal pocket ruler for crafting. I bought it at a hardware store, and it stays in the cup on my crafting table with my scissors and Cricut tools. It's such a friendly size for crafting. Mine is made by SkillTech but it looks the same as this one.
Step 5-B: Covering the cardboard. I used adhesive vinyl, Oracal 651, to complete my book covers. I vinyl craft a lot so had plenty of scraps in my scrap drawer. This worked out like a dream during assembly, since the vinyl is adhesive and you don't have to fool with glue. I did have a small hiccup gluing the pages in later. The tacky glue I used on the pages stuck well to the pages, but wouldn't stick to the vinyl. I ended up using super glue for that. You might consider using some type of paper to cover your cardboard pieces, or skip the tacky glue and go for something stronger that will stick to slick vinyl.
Paper over Vinyl: If you use paper, you'll want the paper to be thin, but not as thin as tissue. Oragami paper would work well, and that's what I'll probably use the next time I craft mini books. Colored copy paper would be okay, but I would not use anything heavier than copy paper. I think construction paper or scrapbooking paper would be too thick to easily fold and glue over the small covers without having bulky corners. Experiment with the papers you already have before buying something else.
Colors needed: You'll need 1 to 3 colors per book. The real Scholastic hardcovers use 3 colors each; for spine, covers, and interior. I simplified that design and used just 2 colors. I had a fair stash of colored adhesive vinyl on hand and was able to closely match the colors used on the books. If you're going to use just one color each book, choose something that matches the jacket artwork.
Size: Cut all of your colored paper or vinyl into strips that are roughly 1/2" taller than your cardboard cover pieces. DO NOT cut them to width all at once, because the width will vary each book in the series.
As shown above, lay out your front and back cover pieces with the spine piece, leaving a tiny margin of space between them. Now is the time to cut your cover vinyl or paper to width, which will be determined by what size the spine is. Trim the corners with scissors. It doesn't need to be exact angles. These edges will be covered in the next step.
If using paper, apply glue with a glue stick, and fold the paper over on all 4 sides. If using adhesive vinyl, peel away the backer paper and fold over.
Interior cover piece: Measure and cut this piece just a tiny bit smaller than the overall height and width of your cover, and apply to the inside.
Step 6: Optional - Apply a hook for hanging Our books are going to be ornaments, so they needed a hanging hook. If your books are not going to be ornaments, skip on to step 7.
In the jewelry section of the craft store, Stephanie found these eye pins.
I adhered them to the inside of the spine of each book cover with a strip of the same adhesive vinyl used on the covers. You could use a strip of duct tape, or super glue. Leave the loop of the eye pin poking out the top of the spine.
I have seen other crafters poke a hole in the top of the spine and thread a jewelry jump ring in there. Another option would be to add a loop with string or ribbon.
Step 7: Glue in the pages, add ribbon or string.
Seven books, seven steps! You're in the home stretch!
I gathered up all the stacks of sticky notes that Stephanie cut and started dividing them up into appropriately-sized stacks for each book cover. I did not count pages, I just eyeballed this. Don't worry if the sticky notes start to be less sticky from being pulled apart and put back together. You're about to glue them.
Inside the spine of each cover, I applied a generous bead of Tacky Glue, then inserted the pages. I closed the book covers around the pages, and cleaned up any excess glue that oozed out with a toothpick. I sat a juice glass on top of each book to hold them closed while the glue dried.
If you used paper on your covers, you're about done! Wait for your books to dry, then wrap the book jackets around them and thread ribbon or cording through the eyehooks. If desired secure the book jackets on the inside flaps with a dot of glue.
If you used adhesive vinyl, as I did, the dried Tacky Glue might peel away from the vinyl-clad cover. I noticed this when I opened up the books to wrap around the jackets. It didn't happen on all of them, but I decided to go ahead and reinforce the glued spine with some super glue. I peeled back the book cover and applied a few dots of super glue to the inside of the spine, then let them dry again.
Wrap the book jackets around them and thread some ribbon or cording or an ornament hook through the eyehooks.
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