Playing Card Journal

A few weeks back I mentioned in my Journaling Small post that I was going to make some guided journals out of some unusual materials, and for the first I started with these:



I did spend all last year working with cards so I was very comfortable transforming this deck into a little flip journal:



I used a couple of scrap pieces of heavy cardstock as covers, and punched two holes in them as well as all the cards, through which I placed two binder rings. I decorated the cover of the journal with some adhesive lettering and the holes I'd punched out of the cards.



I liked the look of the cards so I didn't try to cover them completely; I alternated paper suitable for writing with some pictures I tore out of an old magazine. All of the additions I made were pasted in with a glue stick. I also thought about adding some pre-printed words to inspire, but once I had it all put together I liked it well enough the way it was. Adding the additional papers and images did make the deck too big to fit back into the box, but the extra bulk allows it to stand on its own so that was a nice bonus.

The binder rings are the clasp-type that open and close easily, so you could add extra pages, cards or other bits to this little journal with no problem. You might get more creative by completely covering the cards completely with images, ruled paper, calendar pages etc. (and this would make a great portable day planner, too.) As to what to write in it, there's only space for a few words so you don't want to go all Tolstoy, but that's the point of journaling small. You could use a journal like this for character names, potential story titles, words you encounter that you want to look up or short quotes you find motivating. For a more guided experience, cover half the pages with random images and the other half with paper you can write on. Then indulge in a bit of creative free association each day by examining one image and then jotting down a few words next to it as to what it makes you think.