One year for Christmas, my mother gave me a very old cookbook. Looking at the cover, I was sure that most recipes would be using lard and have measurements like jigger and knobs. I thanked her very much for what I only could guess was a family heirloom. And then I opened it. She had found a book in a thrift store and made it into a hidden compartment book. I use it to this day, blended in with my own recipe books and it stores a bit of cash (delivery tip, forgot to go to the bank money). We discussed how she did it and she told me she cut the box into each page and then glued them all together. I cannot even fathom how long this must have taken. She then put some fabric around the inside edges to finish it off. It makes me smile when I use it and has lasted over 30 years.

Fast forward, as we are cleaning out my MILs house and my spouse has lots of old college text books there. As we have talked about earlier, cleaning out a house is hard and I made the call that we box them all, bring them home and go though them at another time when good decisions could be made.

While deciding paper gator or keep, I got the idea that it might be fun to pick one each for the nephews and I could make secret books for them from their Uncle’s college text books. We picked nice math heavy, equation laden ones.  Their heads will hurt trying to decide why this exact text book made us think of them.

I have been putting off making these books and it is October. Like the dear woman who cuts my hair said today, can you imaging in like 9 weeks it will be 2025. Yikes! But the idea of gluing each page, well yikes again!

I took to the internet (an aside, today I overheard one person asking another about a third person and said “does he internet?” never heard it as a verb before lol) and looked to see how one might do this a bit more easily. Behold, Mod Podge. I have known of Mod Podge my whole life but never even thought of using it in this project.

To quickly sum up (because I know you can internet and find it if you want to) you protect the pages that are normal book in a plastic bag and Mod Podge the outside of the sides of the book where it is going to stay shut. Be careful, just a thin coat, no globbing. Then hold with clamps overnight. Once you put the clamps on then use your brush to clean up and drips. Once it is dry, open the book and cut out the rectangle you want in the middle of the solid pages. When you have the depth you want, Mod Podge the sides of the hole you made in the book, put plastic between the hole and the real book. Clamp again over night. For the center part, you can cut material or felt or just leave it unfinished. So much easier than gluing each page.

I guess the What Did I Learn from this (besides how to make the books), is it never hurts to see if maybe there is an easier way to do something.

One other aside: there are people who will be very upset about “hurting” a book. I love books in all forms. I will and have fought book bannings with ferocity. However, some books have lived their lives and need a new life. It might be a paper gator that recycles. It might be a craft project that gives them new life. And some books, moldy in a basement, or filled with such a smoke scent that will never leave. Those books we need to say thank you and goodbye.