Altered Box and Photo Book Gift Set

Before we moved back to MI, we thought our parents would be long distance Grandparents. So to help them build their connection with their grandchild I made each side a simple on going first year photo book. The book itself is fairly simple, with a page for each monthly growth picture that I took of ER with her special animal lovey Mr. Lion, it was the container for it that I spent most of my time on and I still love how the one I gave my parents turned out.

When I packed up my classroom in anticipation of a lengthy period at home, I decided to conserve room by packaging several games in gallon ziploc bags. Never one to throw anything that might be useful away, my husband hates particular trait, I hung on to several of their boxes if they were especially sturdy. The box I altered for this project used to hold a color matching dominos game.
For it's new life, I painted the inside and outside pink and covered the sides of the box with patterned paper. I created a flower scene using mod podge as my adhesive with cardstock - wish I'd used a subtly patterned blue for the background, die cut shapes, ribbon for the stem, paper pieced sun, metal photo frame, metal flower eyelet, and clear backed sticker that fit perfectly with my theme. The picture I used is one I still have framed from our very first walk, she's so tiny in it that it's hard to believe she'll be three in July!

The inside of the box top I decoupaged with patterned paper and made a mini scrapbook page with pictures taken during my family's last visit to us in NM and embellished with square painted metal brads and chipboard frames, shape, and tag. For the mini book itself I used a premade mini book.

Here's the inside pages, as you can see they are very basic with just a strip of patterned paper, month title that I created all at once on a word processing program, and a die cut flower with die cut button shape center. I attached photos for the months that we'd been apart and then completed the pages for the remaining months except for the monthly picture. This made it easy for my nonscrapbooking parents to complete their book throughout the remaining year. I'd simple email them each new monthly picture, they'd develop it, and add to their book.

Here's a page closer up. I had to plan for fairly flat embellishments since there were a set number of pages and I need to avoid bulk so that it would tie closed and fit inside the box. I think these made a wonderful keepsake gift. I made a set for my MIL too, but haven't had a chance to get a hold of hers to photograph. I've made a number of the month by month keepsake photo mini scrapbooks and they've always been appreciated by the recipients. Most new mothers have a lot of photos that they want to show off but are lacking the time to scrapbook. This gives them an easy way to have a mini brag book that shows how much their little kiddo really did change in a year!

During ER's first year I actually did a series of weekly photos of her with Mr. Lion almost always in the same exact spot on her nursery's pink chair. Since the background is static, it gives you a frame of reference record through pictures the changes throughout the year. I am so glad I have this photo log and would highly reccommend any new mom consider doing this.

I recently used my week by week photos and created a book on Shutterfly to organize and keep them all in once place. Seeing them together and watching the growth with the flip of a few pages is wonderful for this rather sentimental mommy!

For my first week participating in Paper Crafting Wednesday, hosted by There is No Place Like Home, I decided to share one of my all time favorite projects. It's a scrapbook, gift, and display piece all in one. Update 3/1/11: Also added to Maryanne's & Christine's Baby Themed Events: