Altered Record Album

Today I have an altered project to share with you.  I look at things (especially things in second hand stores) and wonder what they could be turned into.  I came across this great old record album in Value Village. It was in good condition and designed to hold 45's.
                                         

 

 

Paid a whole $2.99 for it and it even came with a few of the records still in it.  I saw somewhere the idea of painting records and hanging them on the wall for décor, but my walls are already crammed with stuff so scratched that idea.  Being a book-a-holic I immediately thought it would make a great altered book so I purchased a few more records to fill up the empty sleeves.  I painted both sides of the records with fluid acrylic paints, leaving some of the black vinyl of the record showing through, and with distinct brush marks showing.  It gives them a worn and imperfect look that I like.  A couple coats of paint was plenty.  I painted the label portion too.  I then fussy cut out images of birds from a second-hand child's bird book I had found on a previous visit to VV and glued them to the records (both sides) with Mod Podge. 

  

 

  

 
Since there were twelve records, I used stamps and Staz-on ink to stamp the name of a month on each of them.  I also added stamped images of feathers.  With paint markers I hand wrote a quote about nature or birds on each side of the records.  A few coats of Mod Podge over the whole lot and the records were done.  I chose to use minimal embellishment on the sleeves themselves, as they were a beautifully aged brown paper.  I just used distress ink and stamped on images of grass and ferns.

 

A record in each sleeve, and there you have it:  a calendar/book of sorts.  This was a fun and easy project, though it did take a while for all that fussy cutting.  I love birds and vintage images so this gave me a chance to put it all together into an unusual creation. 

                            

I hope this gets you thinking about things in a different way.  The great thing about altered projects is there are no rules and the sky is the limit.  You can make just about anything out of just about anything.