Book Making

So I have been trying to come up with a way to make my hubby's 30th bday a BIG one! I am one of those people that love traditions. I love to make somewhat ordinary days even better. I think the best way to do this is to have some fun "special" traditions in place. I have found a ton of cute ideas on the web I want to incorporate plus some of my own. But this year for my man, I decided to ask everyone I possibly could to write a special birthday wish for him. I asked for a favorite memory or something they admired about him too. Just cuz a bunch of "Happy Birthday" messages alone, while nice, might not mean quite as much to him. I hacked his Facebook account and his email account and asked everyone to send me a quick note. I even created a special email account just for this purpose so he wouldn't see it on accident. I got a great response. I was SO pleased!! (I think the coolest thing about this project was that it will not only be cool for him to see what people like about him, but I also learned quite a bit about him too. Not bad for being married almost 7 years. I guess there is always something to learn about each other!)

My first idea was to use a deck of cards and make one of those fun "52 Things" books. I was going to put 52+ memories/wishes. But I figured it had been done before and wanted to create my own idea. Plus, once some of the memories rolled in, I realized a lot of them were too long to fit in such a small space.

I figured out how big I wanted my book to be, well at least the pages. I wanted to be able to get 8 memories on a page, 4 on each side. I set up the margins in Word and created 2 columns. I copied and pasted everyone's wishes from their emails and changed the font type and size so they would all match. I wanted to print the wishes on both sides of the paper so I could create an actual book, similar to the way they bind some books. Then I figured out this oh so high tech way of making sure they were printed correctly. See the crazy chicken scratch below.I decided to do 2 sheets of paper stapled together. I will explain it, but I don't know if it really makes sense to anyone but me!! Basically what I did was take 2 sheets of scratch paper and fold them in half lengthwise and the short way too. Then I ripped them in half lengthwise since that is how I wanted mine to be. I put all 4 of the pieces on top of each other and numbered each side 1-16. Then I took them apart and matched up each of the halves so they were whole again. Now I could see which memories I needed to place where so when they were bound they would match up. Most of the time it didn't really matter where they were printed, but if they were really long and needed 2 pages to them, that is when I needed them to match up. Make sense?? I hope so. Then I had to do this a few more times because I had more than just 16 memories. I am sure there is an easier way but my mind was only working this way. (I was also trying to make cookies and brownies and keep my crazy kiddos happy. I was actually surprised that the whole thing lined up when I was done!!) Once I actually printed them all out, I cut them in half lengthwise and stapled them. I did this in groups of 4 just because I didn't want to have too much bulk. I cut a piece of 12x12 cardstock in half. Then later I ended up cutting it down so it wasn't too tall for my paper.
Then because I don't have a scorer. I just used my fancy ball point pen and my paper cutter's indents to score the edge of the book in two places. I did it about 6.25" in from each side.
Then it created a book with an edge.
I decided to round off my corners to give it a little more of a fun look, but not too girly.Then I grabbed some E-6000 glue to use for the "binding." This stuff holds well but stinks pretty dang bad. So beware and use in a highly ventilated area. Slather some on and put in your pages. You could use clips to keep this tight til it dries. I would give it enough time to dry too. It takes a little while.
Then I added paper that I had distressed on the front and back of the book. I decided to not put anything else on the front mainly because its for my hubby. I think simple and manly is better for him. I doubt he would appreciate much frill or girliness!And like that, there is a book ready for the old man...well he is only 30 and since I will be there very soon too. I guess I won't crack any over the hill jokes on his behalf. I can't wait to see his reaction!!

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