If you are a parent, you have undoubtedly come upon a crime scene like this:

The victim: A perfectly good book

The perpetrator: Chubby Hands

The crime: Shredding pages when Mom thinks Chubby Hands is sleeping

It’s hard to know what to do with books once they’ve been victimized.  Tape?  Staples?  Sometimes that’s the best way to go.  But we have some books in our library that have been taped so many times, they resemble a collection of Egyptian mummies.  Any reasonable person would throw those books away.

But I’m a bibliophile, and I can’t stand throwing away books, especially since the most abused books in our library are my favorites.

So instead of throwing out those beloved books, I turned them into magnets!  Every day, I get to enjoy these little reminders of the many sweet times I’ve spent reading to my children.  That’s much better than tossing them in the trash!

Here’s what you need:

1 ruined book (The Very Hungry Caterpillar makes darling magnets!)

1 (or more) packages of bubble magnets (see below)

Modge Podge (you can buy it at the craft store or make your own using equal parts Elmer’s and water)

Scissors or a 1″ paper punch

Craft glue or a hot glue gun

Here’s what you do:

The process is very simple.  I picked up a couple packages of bubble magnets at Staples for about $1.99 each.  You can get the clear plastic bubbles at the craft store, but they’re way more expensive and don’t include the magnets!

It is very easy to peel the magnets apart and remove the previous graphic.

Using the magnet, find images or words from the book that you’d like to magnify under the bubble and trace it with a pencil.  Cut it out with a sharp scissors.  If you have a  1″ punch, you could use that to punch out the images instead, but the punches don’t work on board books.

Brush modge podge on the underside of the acrylic bubble, being  careful not to get it on your fingers or on the top of the bubble.  Place your circle cutout face-down into the goop and flip it back over onto some aluminum foil or parchment paper.  You should be looking at your image under the plastic bubble!  Press out any air pockets and continue with the rest of the circles until you are finished.

Double check to make sure you didn’t get any modge podge on the tops of the bubbles.  If you did, wipe it off with a damp sponge.  Double check for air  bubbles as well, and then use a heavy book to weigh down the tops of the magnets while they dry.  This may take several hours.

Once dry, glue the magnets to the back of the bubbles using a hot glue gun or heavy-duty craft glue.  Allow to dry completely.

That’s it.  You’re done!  Aren’t they adorable?  I love them so much, I actually look for broken books at thrift stores.  They make great gifts for baby or bridal showers, teacher appreciation gifts, or even a travel tic-tac-toe game for the kids (just use two different books for the pieces and a metal tin to serve as both the game board AND storage container).   Have fun!