In Which I Do Something Almost Like A Craft!

Today I did something like a craft project!


I like notebooks. I’ve talked about that before.


Good notebooks come with a little bit of ribbon to mark the current page you’re working on. I have four good notebooks like that, but I have a heck of a lot of inexpensive notebooks, too.

Normally I just stick in a blank sheet of paper to mark my current place in a notebook, but that causes trouble. When I open the notebook and go to work I always misplace the blank sheet or I write on it then I need to keep it in a folder and find another blank sheet somewhere. Blank sheets work as page markers but they’re trouble.

A normal bookmark like the kind libraries give away doesn’t work for me because I lose them, too, or they’re so thick they leave an embossed mark on the pages of a notebook if you leave them in there.


So the solution, obviously, is to make a little ribbon-like arrangement for inexpensive notebooks just like the kind of thing that comes built into good notebooks.


And that’s what I did. Just like a real arts and crafts person!

I went to the big arts and craft store around here and bought some cool, hippie-approved multi-colored yarn.

Then I cut a piece to length and secured its middle to the outside arc of the top spiral metal loop of my big inexpensive drawing notebook using a binding type knot called a constrictor knot.

Then I tied a stopper type knot called a figure eight knot into both ends of the yarn so the pieces wouldn’t fray and unravel. I cut the ends a little long so that above the stopper knot I could fray that little section on purpose so that it looks fluffy.


Then I did the same thing to my inexpensive watercolor notebooks and smaller drawing notebooks.


Now I don’t have to worry about losing my place in my notebooks.


When civilization crumbles and we all have to live by our wits and craft skills, I am set — just so long as survival is predicated on cutting yarn and tying two or three different kinds of knots. And, to be very honest, that is the kind of post-apocalypse I am very much hoping for.

I’m ready!

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I talked about the three main kinds of knots before. But there are specialty kinds, too, like binding knots and stopper knots.

A Craft Of Knots


That book in the background is “The Craft of Sail,” by Jan Adkins, and I’ve talked about that before, too. Since my local library got rid of its copies I bought my own copy.

An Embrace On The Past


I don’t know if I would have done this if I hadn’t met the one-who-isn’t-Jamie and heard about her bird-seed-candle-holder. At least my craft doesn’t cause poor freezing, starving birds to go hungry.

The Damn Punk Human Who Isn’t Jamie