Matt called me on Friday and I couldn’t answer because I was covered in glue and ink. When I eventually rang him back he asked what I’d been up to, and I said “making mud pies” … he was, naturally, a bit baffled. I imagine you are too.
Making mud pies is something I think of as fun and pointless. You do it when you’re a kid, but when you’re grown up you don’t any more. So, for me, making a mud pie is something that I do in my studio which is both fun and pointless.
So, what exactly was I doing in my studio on Friday? Well, I wanted to do something but didn’t really have the energy or focus to work on anything important (I have a couple of commissions which need starting, but Friday just wasn’t a day for that sort of thing).
If you’re a regular reader you’ll know that I stash things, which are often very random, away until I can find a use for them. Amongst the random things I’ve accumulated were some old Moleskine covers that someone else had discarded. Two were resurrected into new notebooks and went to new homes quite some time ago, but there was one left.
I didn’t feel in the mood for making a notebook but I did want to do something so I just got on with it and started work. I had no real aim in mind, other than perhaps experimenting with some inking techniques. First I covered it with pages from a vintage road atlas…
… then I added a strip of leather to the spine and had a play with some Distress Inks (by Tim Holtz) to give both the edges of the cover and the leather itself a slightly aged/vintaged look…
That random square of leather is just there to show you what the original colour of the leather was before I got all distressy with the ink. By this stage I’d decided what this was going to be: a sort of folder/folio type thing for holding letters and stationery. I write a lot of letters, and I figured this would be a good way to tote letters, stationery and stamps around when I’m away from home for a few days. On that theme I decided to use some brown parcel paper (also slightly distressed with ink) to line the inside.
Looking good, huh?
I’m chuffed to bits with my little mud pie. It looks great, it’s useful (which is not in the mud pie spirit at all), and I spent a very happy morning in my studio creating it. I also got to grips with the Distress Inks (which are still quite new to me) and have the satisfaction of having used up yet another bit of tat that was taking up precious studio space. I’m away for a short break by the seaside at the moment and the mud pie is full of letters, cards, and stamps so that I can catch up with my letters while sitting on the beach (if the weather holds).
I think they’re fabulous, and my first thought was that I couldn’t possibly use them, I just wanted to stick them up in my studio! However, I had a look at 
