Handmade journal tutorial part two

Welcome back and lets get started on part two of how to make a homemade journal.
Yesterday we finished by getting our 4 folios ready.
Today we need to staple those. If you're lucky and have one of those long reach staples this part should be easy. You are simply going to put two staples in the fold of each folio. If you don't have one of those, don't fret because I don't either.
 Open your stapler up, lay the fold of your folio on a big eraser and staple through the paper into the eraser. I stapled about a 1/2 to 3/4 of an inch in on each end. When you are done simply bull the eraser off.

Now you can flip it over and bend back the ends of the staples. Don't worry too much if you can't get the staple exactly on the fold. I didn't and it didn't seem to matter. Just get it as close as you can. Also the original directions I followed said to staple from the back to the front but I did it the other way around on this second book and that didn't seem to make a difference either

 In the bottom picture above you will notice then when your pages are folded over they are not exactly even. You can leave them like this if you want or you can trim them. I trimmed both of mine and I did it two different ways. The first time I did it with a ruler and a craft knife. You'll need to go slow and make repeated slices through all the layers. The second time I used a guillotine cutter. It's much easier but I wouldn't run out and buy one just for this project if you don't already have one.

Moving right along. Stack your four folded and stapled folios together and get some clips to hold them tightly together. You could also use large paper clips, rubber bands or anything that is going to keep them tight.We are going to be gluing this edge and you don't want any of the glue to seep down in between or your pages are going to be stuck together.  

 The bottom picture above shows that although the folios aren't real tight against each other I was able to squeeze them together while applying the glue. What kind of glue you ask? You have some choices here. I for one chose to use hot glue only because I tend to be messy with white glue and I knew it wouldn't end well. You could use white glue though just be very careful, maybe applying it with a brush.
You are also going to need a strip of fabric that is the same height at your pages and about 5 times as wide. If you are making the same size book as I did your strip will be 5.5" x roughly 1.5".

Now I just could not figure out a way to photograph applying the glue and adhering the fabric strip because using hot glue you need to work rather quickly. But What you do is apply glue to the bound, folded edges of your folios and center the strip of fabric on the glue. The top and bottom picture show the fabric after it has been glued to the edge from two different angles.

Tomorrow we start on the cover and then finish the book. See ya then