{ bee + spool }

Then, at the fresh lemonade stand at the State Fair last summer.

Now, a work in progress by Didi Menendez.

Long craft-deprived, I finally took this past weekend to crack the knuckles, pull out my Print Gocco and complete a chapbook project for twenty-one Kundiman fellows who exchanged poems written on postcards for the month of September 2007. Ten poets contributed their small-size poems.

After months of mulling it over, conceiving of it and mostly just not getting around to it, I charged forward last weekend by visiting SCRAP, hoping to find some different papers or envelopes at rock-bottom, re-use prices. The warehouse had several reams of textured cover stock in a beige-type color. Not sexy, but I thought it’d contrast well with the ream of turquoise copy paper I got at Staples a few months back for the purposes of chapbook-making and paper projects in general.

Fast forward one weekend later. I layed out and edited the interior of the booklet on Adobe Pagemaker on Saturday night, went to OfficeMax for double-sided copying Sunday morning. (Tip: OfficeMax offered color paper at the self-service copiers for the same price as regular white copy paper, but I did not partake as I’d already brought my turquoise paper). Sunday afternoon I created the Gocco-ready cover image, then flashed the screen with these Gocco bulbs pictured here as glistening still-life in the Sunday afternoon light.

The covers were printed on the Gocco using brown and pearlescent aqua inks.  Sunday night, albeit with an interlude at The Fillmore (Stephen Malkmus and the Jicks), I completed binding, with brown linen thread, an edition of 40 baby chapbooks for contributors, postcard writers and Kundiman-related folk. Other helpful project materials included a Stella.

The product specs for this little chappy, “Postcard Poems by Kundiman poets” ({bee + spool} press 2008): Dimensions 4.25″ (w) x 5.5″ (h). 16 pages.  Edition of 40.

Contents of a postcard received in the Wednesday afternoon mail:

Top Ten Things
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