Book 'em Dano

Please love me even though it takes me 3 months to report on one weekend!!
Okay?
Thanks.
My love gift token from our retreat consisted of Little Golden Books that were spiral bound with blank pages inside.


It was super fun to shop for Little Golden Books along the way.
Picking out just the right one for each friend.

Whether she was a Burn Unit Nurse, a teacher or has a hypochondriac son named Tommy, I tried to capture her essence in the written word.
Wait, that's not right. Because one friend got Saggy, Baggy Elephant and she's neither saggy, baggy or elephant-like.
I just thought she would like elephants and I liked the colors on the cover. :)I took my books to my local UPS copy store.
They cut off the binding.
I took them home and cut all the blank paper down to the size of the cover, after the cutting.

Placed the blank pages in between story pages. Took them back to the UPS store where they put that nifty little spiral binding on them for.......I think it was $3.50 a book.

I had some cute cards that I bought off of Etsy in a weak moment of frivolity and had NOTHING to do with them. Whew, good thing I had that weak moment because I think they made charming tags. Whew, good thing my daughter thought of that!

Also this same daughter whined for a good 3 days crying, "Can't I have ONE?"
No.
In the meantime I am looking for just the right book for her. Something like, "Moody Marsha goes to the Zoo". Let me know if you see it anywhere.

The journaling possibilities are endless......count with me

~Teacher gifts! SO much better than the thing I did last year!!!

~Baby journals SWEET!! If you really want a snazzy gift, individualize the pages. I'm all about snazzy! Not really, but I friends who are.

~Write down family recipes and pass on. Oh, I have this totally awesome vintage Disney cookbook that Corrie Dawn gave me and wouldn't I be the best sister ever if................

~Get acid free paper and you could put pictures and have a mini photo album, with the cute little photo corners

~Address book=make an original page w/lines for numbers and addresses and then photo copy the rest to insert inside. I SO need one of these!!

~For quilters.....put in grid paper for designing

~For artists....sketchbook paper

~Find one of the MANY Night before Christmas books and turn it into a special Christmas Journal/Photo album. Okay, THAT's my favorite idea!!

~Let the theme of the book dictate the type of book.....I have a cute little Cub Scout book that would be fun to put my son's old badges in. I could sew them to the paper!!! Since, I never sewed them on his actual shirt!!! I knew my procrastination would pay off. Are you catching the vision??!!

Let me know what you come up with!!
I might not sleep tonight.
I have more books to think about!

Tip: I used a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser to clean up the fronts/backs of some of the books. Sometimes they'll have a sticky sticker or grubby marks all over the front. Take this eraser and gently rub the spot. If you rub too hard, you'll take off more than you want. BUT, I did use it to rough up one of the newer looking books.