I love sudoku. I don’t get very much time to partake in them but I find them invaluable for killing time when traveling. During most of my airport trips I always make a point to pick up a book of them. But my absolute favorite ones (because they are just the right level of trickyness) are the ones the Irish Times publishes. But, of course, I can’t pick of a copy all that easily over here in Scotland. But (happily for me) they make their daily sudoku’s available for download here. So I’ve been saving them up, meaning to do something with them for ages. And because it is no good carrying scraps of loose paper around the whole time, I thought I’d use this as an opportunity to try by hand at binding.

I bind things alot for my professional work and because of this I have developed a personal preference for hot glue bindings. Something which I have thought I could rival at home. So here it is. A really, really simple way of glue binding booklets. Perfect for home made books (like mine) or sketchbooks and notepads. Having tried it, I’m now going to give every type of notepad a go!

All you need is:

• Scraps of paper cut to the size you want your booklet
• A plastic based glue (I used UHU, Bostik would be fine too)
• Bulldog clips
• Scraps of balsa wood or thick card
• Decorative paper or card for cover
• Double sided tape

To assemble:

1. Gather your notebook pages and align them. Trying not to disturb them, place a strip of balsa/card either side of the edge you wish to bind and hold in place using bulldog clips
2. Using your glue nozzle, spread glue evenly and thoroughly along the spine
3. When set, remove the balsa and check that all pages are secure (If pages are loose, redo steps 1-2). Take your intended cover paper. Cut two pieces to the height of your notepad. Take one piece and cut to the length of your notepad, this is the back cover. Take your second piece and cut one inch longer than the back, this is the front cover.
4. Using double sided tape, secure the back cover by placing tape on the spine side of the back of the book and attaching the back cover.
5. Again, using double sided tape, secure the front cover along the spine and back of the book. The extra one inch length on the cover should wrap over the spine and over to the back. And that’s it. It take only a few minutes.

I used an old screen print for my front and back cover and then I added some letraset letters to write ‘sudoku’ on my new booklet. Have fun with it!