blog books

I think there are 82 different ways to do these and all of them are bomb. here's allie style:

*I use banners I've made during that year for my cover. easy peasey.
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*I sometimes forget to type in what I want on the spine so I use a sharpie. and it still bugs me. Shutterfly goes up to 100 pages per book so if I can't fit it in I do 2 volumes.
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*I design the whole page in photoshop. all the picture arranging and titles and writing and everything. it's much faster for me that way and I can just put something where I want it instead of looking for a template to match.
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*for each year I pick new fonts. fun ones for titles and readable ones for the words.
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*using keyboard shortcuts for cutting and pasting and resizing and moving and everything speeds this process up quite a bit. and bonus I feel like one of those cool people on movies that types frantically for a minute to stop the train from exploding or the door on the hatch closing on someone.
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*I stuck with white backgrounds. it doesn't get old and it looks like my blog.
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*when there was lots of text I found myself dividing it up into columns or trying to keep it near the picture it goes with
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*once in a while I knock your socks off with a cute little mug like this one. my books are 12 inch square so that's a lot of Lily.
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*when I loved the comments or they made me laugh I included them. most of the time I did a screen capture (you know the PrntScrn button) and pasted it into photoshop. I cleaned it up a little like cropped it down to what I actually wanted and then included it on the page.
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*once in a while I'd leave a super dumb post out all together
*if I included links I usually added in the actual url in parentheses (http://www.awesome.com) that's not really one though
*sometimes I'd put a couple of posts on one page if they were miniscule
*back in the day I posted tons of video slideshows I made so occasionally I would show a screen capture of those too just to remind me what I'm talking about in the book
*we love looking at them! my goal this year is to blog enough to make a book....so far, lame.

8 comments:

  1. Haha, awesome.com. You should totally reserve that domain. It would be totally awesome. *B

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  2. holy guacamole!!!
    this is the MOST AMAZING idea ever for a blog book.
    i have been trying for years to get just 1 album book published thru blurb... but just can't seem to do it.
    it is so tedious & boaring.
    this looks fun & has so much life & color.
    i mayhave to give this a shot... although i know mine will not turn out anywhere as fun as yours!!!

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  3. Now my new goal in life is to write a comment worthy to be printed in one of your books. . . thank you for giving meaning to my life.

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  4. 'member when you told me to blog about this. I didn't--- because I had NOTHING clever to offer like you--- I just used the stupid program and the stupid templates and half of my pictures weren't good enough resolution and since I've gone through 3 computers I can't always find my original pictures... and yours looks RADical, so now I'm even more annoyed at mine-- AND I finally committed to working on the second 400 page book right after Finn was born and now I wish I'd done a 12x12 because I love everything you do...


    hhhhhhhhhh--- that's an inhale. because that was a long sentence and I typed super duper fast so it felt like one. oh how I lovity love it when you blog.

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  5. So are you just going along on your blog in another screen and copying and pasting the text? And finding the original photos in your picture folders somewhere? Are you organized for that? I'm not.

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  6. PS- I think you're pretty dang versatile. Which is why I've left you an award on my blog ;) Check it out, yo! *B

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  7. Well aren't you just little miss talented. I wish I would have known you take pictures! You do an awesome job for a great price! Next time I'll be calling you, so get ready! Glad to know I could be at your service for a little blog stalking :) Feel free to do it anytime!

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  8. thank you for the inspiration! This is on my 40- before 40 list and I am now in the mood to get started! Here's hoping mine turns out as cute as yours!

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