Two weeks to fix one paper cut, I almost threw the whole project out

Started a folded book art piece for my sisters birthday and the pattern called for 5 pages to be sliced at a specific angle. My exacto knife slipped on page 3 and tore a chunk out of the middle of the text block. Tried glue, tried paper pulp, even tried coloring the white edge with marker and it all looked worse. Ended up carefully cutting the same shape from another old dictionary and stitching it in with thread. Total repair time was 12 hours over two weeks, way longer than the actual folding took. Has anyone else had a catastrophic slip mid project and how did you fix it without starting over?

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james_ross21d ago

Stitching a patch in with thread is honestly clever, I would've just thrown the book at the wall. Last time I tried to fix a mangled corner on a scrapbook page I ended up just gluing a random receipt over it and calling it "artistic layering". My sister still brings up the crooked birthday card I made her in 2019 where I sliced my thumb open and bled on the envelope, she framed the damn thing. Sounds like you beat the odds with that dictionary patch, hope your sister appreciates the extra 12 hours of love.