An altered book, Fairy Tale style, or Fun with Trophies

This year, I've made a lot of class kits that needed book covers. Therefore, I had a LOT of naked books. Most of them, I recycled, but a few I saved to play with. 

I'd always wanted to try making one of these folded page thingies with a story book theme. For this one, I chose Cinderella because Beth gave me a ballroom dancing trophy that reminded me of a prince charming and his true love.

I primed and painted the trophy, then took it apart, it was easier to paint the topper while it was attached.  Her dress got a sugary coat of glitter, I added some crowns, and set it aside.

The fun part was adding the storybook elements.  This broken, old cameo looked like Cinderella to me, so was perfect for the front of the piece.

In my kitchen, I had a pile of white, paper clay, pumpkins in a dish to set out for fall decorating, and stole one of those to use as a pre-carriage.

There was a big pile of old, old, Cinderella books all piled up on my booksheft to sift through for ideas. But I decided to keep this diorama cohesive by using illustrations from the same book.  This one was published in the 1800s.

All the figures that I cut out, got backed with cardstock from Bingo cards. Tabs were made on the feet so I'd have something to glob glue on and slide between the pages to make the people stand up.

When I cut out pages to make the opening for the scene, I didn't do a very good job, it was pretty uneven and ragged. I'd say a dremel tool would be the way to go.  To cover up my choppy mess, I covered it in flocked wallpaper, which I thought looked appropriately royal.

At the top of the cut out opening, I covered up the badly cut pages with a ruffle of crepe paper. I'm all about making it work, somehow or another.  After all that work of ripping that dang book apart, I wasn't going to dump it because I'd done it so poorly. I just hid the mistakes behind layers.

I would do dozens and dozens of these if there wasn't that pesky part about folding the hundreds of pages and cutting out the opening.

Tedious times ten. 

But worth it.  Maybe I'll fold pages some evening in front of the TV. I really did enjoy the creative part of the project.

This trophy got a more simple makeover.  The topper was glittered, added to a big spool, then sat on a box lid covered in sheet music.

Layers of crepe paper, and some German foil, a magic wand, a couple bits-o-bling, and ta dah.

And doesn't everything look better under glass?