A Guest Book for Baby

I threw together a quick project on Friday night.

Last year at Thanksgiving I whipped together one of Cathy Zielske's "2009 Thankful Albums" as a hostess gift for my sister-in-law. It was a great little thank you. And a way for those in attendance to make some remarks about what they are thankful for. Too fun.

Cathy has just introduced a 2010 version. You can read about that HERE.

This Thanksgiving - I've got a lot on my mind besides turkey, stuffing, and good times. So I decided to modify Cathy's templates to make a little guest book for when the baby arrives.

First I purchased a cute little 4x6 photo album at Target. They have these in a variety of colors, and I wanted to know what colors I'd be using so I could design my pages around that scheme.

This is the finished product, mind you. When I bought it - there was no "hello" tag... but I forgot to take a pic of it until it was done. :)  Just imagine it without the tag.

Then, I opened my Cathy Zielske 2009 Thankful Album Kit:

and with a little Photoshop trickery... modified the 4x6 cards to look like this:

I used the Ali Edwards Word Art Brush from her Simple Celebrations Baby Element Kit, and Cathy Zielske's DottedNDashed Circles Kit to dress it up a little.

Then I printed them out on 4x6 index cards. It was easier than printing them onto 8.5 x 11 cardstock and trimming them. Especially since I did 48 of them. Not that I'm expecting 48 guests after the baby arrives, but I don't want to have to go back and print more. I'd rather have MORE than enough - than to have to do a reprint.

Once they were done printing, I stuffed them into the slots in the album (leaving the first two pages blank).

And added these title pages to the beginning.

 
And finally I printed off the tag onto some cardstock and adhered it to a metal rimmed office tag (this element was also modified from Cathy's 2009 Thankful Album kit). And then I stapled it to the elastic band that wraps around the album. (see the pic above)

Now comes the really cool part. You see that block of white space on the right side of the index card?

Well, I ordered this cute little polaroid style camera from Amazon (hopefully it will come in before I head to the hospital!) on Friday too.

It takes instant pictures that are just about the size of a credit card.

Basically, when folks come to say hello to the new bambina - I'll have the guest book, some pens, and the camera ready to go. They can write down their sentiment, and get their mugshot taken, and in a matter of minutes I can stick their "photo booth style pic" right down on the card and back into the album.

I'm rather excited to see this little keepsake be put to good use.

Here are a few more shots of the project as it stands now....

 

Comments

[heidi]

how cute is that??? whowouldathought?? amazing how you just throw these things together...love it!

[Sarah M.]

Oh my goodness I NEED to make one of these!!! Baby #2 is due in March so I have plenty of time to make one. Plus it gives me an excuse to go to Target. :)

[Yolanda]

Found this via a link form Ali Edwards on Facebook. I truly love this idea and am tucking it away for future use. Best wishes to you for a safe and healthy delivery.

[Liz]

You are so talented. Beautiful!

I am thinking that this would be a great shower gift.

[amy tangerine]

adorable!!

[cia]

So cute! I have a question: I can't see the staple where the tag is attached to the elastic on the front. Is that because you put the sticker over the staple or because you hadn't stapled it yet in that picture?

I put a similar tag on the cover of my December Daily, but I can't get it to stay (currently adhered with glue dots) and I'm wondering whether or not I would like the look of a staple, so I'm curious how you made it work.

[Katie Pegher]

@ cia :: Yes - I stapled the metal rimmed tag to the elastic band and then pasted the "hello" tag (punched with a 1 1/4" punch from cardstock) down on it with some tape runner adhesive.

I've used this method on several of these 4x6 albums and haven't encountered a problem with people taking it on and off and on... It stays put.

[cia]

thanks so much for your response, I appreciate it!

[melanie]

What a super adorable little album- and congrats on your arrival, she is so beautiful!

[nfSnoddyPhypeeut]

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