Last Minute Gift: Fabric Covered Notebooks

Do you still need a last minute gift idea? I just made this cute little set of 6 fabric covered notebooks and it only takes an hour to do! On top of that, this is a great stash-busting project, as you can make 4 journal covers with just one fat quarter. I chose these pretty Amy Butler prints that I had been saving for a rainy day. These notebooks are great gifts for anyone who likes writing, or staying organized, or just likes jotting things down so they can remember them later. To make this gift really special, you could include a nice pen, or some pretty stickers.

To complete this project you will need some small journals (I used Moleskine 5" x 8 1/4" ruled journals, which come in packs of 3), some quilters cotton or similar lightweight woven fabric and Krylon Easy-Tack repositionable adhesive. I also used some white linen, a Sharpie paint pen and some coordinating thread to make labels for the fronts of my journals. You could also choose another fabric or trim to decorate the fronts of your notebooks.

I cut my fat quarters into 4, each about 11" by 10" which worked perfectly for the books I had. If you are using different sized books, you want to cut your fabric about 1/2" bigger all around than the size of the journals cover.

You can customize the fronts of your notebooks like I have by writing on white linen, or other solid coloured fabric, with a Sharpie paint-pen. Cut out the text in any shape you like and sew to the front side of your print fabric with a zigzag stitch in a coordinating colour. Pull the thread ends to the back, hand knot and snip short.

Mark the center line lightly on the wrong side of your fabric with a pencil. Make 2 small snips on either side of the center line, top and bottom, as wide apart as the bound spine of your notebook. Fold and glue these tabs down. Lay fabric right side down on some newsprint and spray the back with the glue. Line the spine up with the center and smooth the fabric down on each side of the cover. If you don't get it right the first time, the adhesive is repositionable, so you can peel back each side and smooth down any wrinkles. Open the book, clip the fabric around the corners. Fold the clipped corners down first, and then the sides for each cover. Done!