tip of the day.....

Today I wanted to talk about mini albums. I've been working on an album for my grandmother's 90th birthday. I thought it would be a great idea to have ALL of my family's pictures included--I've ended up with 42 pages! I knew that this would be a big project and realized, that without really thinking about it I follow this pattern to make mini albums whatever they are. I wanted to share my "secret" with you.

1. Keep it simple! Because of people's varying tastes (and because I would like people to REALLY enjoy their albums) I keep the embellishments simple. (Especially because it adds BULK to the pages....)

--examples: glitter glue, brads, rubons, sewing, jewels.

2. I use only about 5 different colors of cardstock as the background paper.

3. I use maybe 9 sheets of pattern paper for the whole album (depending on the size it could be more it could be less.) This particular album I used the same line, in the paste I have used paper that matched.

4. I make my own covers. I have a stash of chipboard that I have collected just for making my own albums. I cut it to the size I want and cover away.

5. binding your own album. If you happen to want to make your own covers you have a few options. I have a bind it all, I usually use this. But for this album I am using O-rings because it's SO large. If you do not own a binding machine and you want it bound, you can take it to an office supply store and have it done for a nominal fee.

6. And I think this is the most important after deciding what size I was going to develop the pictures at. I pre assembled the pages so all that I had to do was plop the pictures on the pages.

Now you may be asking why I didn't just do this digitally. The thought did cross my mind for about a second. Getting every one's pictures was a task! And I still don't have 4.....I really liked the creative process, getting my hands on the paper and working it! I think that's about it--thanks for stopping in at SBC today!