I’m making good progress with my Anthe Book of Days, having completed all twelve flower pages and wordplays I started stitching the pages together last week. However I still needed a front title page and a back page, otherwise January and December would have to be attached to the cover.

Having decided on a name for my book, I wrote it out on graph paper in my usual cross-stitch font. In case you’re wondering, Anthea means blossom or flower in Greek, the flower pages were designed by Faby Reilly and called the Anthea Calendar. Back in the day, a book of days was a journal in which the writer would record the minutae of their lives. I also found out today about the song by Enya called Book of Days, it’s meaning is described as

“Life may bring both ups and downs to me, but I will still be fighting and staying brave, come what may and wherever I may go, daring to believe in my dreams.”

…which isn’t a bad quote for last year!!

I decided as a background to the title to embroider the names of some of my favourite flowers, just in a light green so it would almost blend in with the background, not competing with the title. I used one of the borders from Faby’s designs which I think looks really pretty.

When I was cutting my linen for this page I cut it so I could have a wide border on the inside edge, my thinking being that I can use this to attach the book to the cover. It would have helped if I hadn’t started to trim this side when preparing to stitch the page!! You can see the snip on the bottom photo! I’m hoping a square of iron-on interfacing will sort that out, and maybe a little embroidery!

I repeated the wide edge on the back page. I’ve been stitching the pages together along the back-stitched edge using whip-stitch. This wasn’t possible with the front cover if I was to keep the wide inside edge, I therefore used a ladder stitch for this seam instead.

I kept the back page much simpler with just a short paragraph and my name, I was going to do a pretty border but I decided it would be too squashed..

…and with the spelling mistake corrected! Thanks Claire 🙂 Typical it’s the last line of the last page, I knew there was a reason for leaving three spaces between words instead of my usual two…

I’ve stitched nine pages together so far, so just four more to do. Then I need to work out how to bind the pages together and make the cover. I’ve started a new tab at the top called textile books and in it I’m linking all these posts about the making of the actual book.