Thursday, April 1, 2010

Timothy's Birthday Book

There was a time when I was not sure how many of my little brother, Timothy's, birthdays I might be able to spend with him so - for his 10th birthday - I created a book that incorporated snatches from some of the stories I had read to him when he was small enough to fit beside me in a creaky, overstuffed rocking chair.  The binding is made of acid-free boards covered in handmade marbled paper and with brown silk quarter binding on the front cover. Also on the front cover is an amber cabochon carved hollow from the reverse with my cypher, held to tte the board with a pair of sterling silver straps and surrounded by a band of silver wire wrapped in silk interspersed with seed pearls. Behind the amber are two lilac seeds from the bush our mother planted in our grandmother's back yard on the edge of Bay City, MI. The spine of the book is held together with stitching of waxed linen thread detailed in brown silks. The text block of the book is ma,de of watermarked hand-laid paper from England and the pages consist of my own illustrations to the stories that Timothy grew up hearing with a page here and there headed by the date of a birthday in his future from his 10th birthday to his 21st. Under each date is a question I might have asked him had I been there for that birthday. The book was made seven years ago and is beginning to show wear...SPM

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