Katie's Nesting Spot: Sand Castle Photo Album Mini Book

I have been in love with photo album scrapbooks since the first moment I saw the concept in an issue of Simple Scrapbooks Magazine. It gave me a measure of freedom from the piles of pictures I have in my "to be scrapped" box. Now I can highlight a few on a layout but still do something special, but most importantly QUICK, with the rest.

When I saw this darling Sand Castle Scrapbook in the August 2009 issue of Family Fun Magazine that I knew it would be the perfect embellishement for the cover. I didn't realize just how literal my scraplift would be until I noticed I had the same K&Company line as used in the example.

To resize the castle template for a 4X6 plastic photo album, I opened the PDF file. When the printer dialog box opened I looked under the heading "Page Handling" then "Page Scaling" and picked the setting "Multiple pages per sheet". This automatically resized them for me, although depending on which programs your computer uses, your method might be different.

The album is one of those 1UP books with plastic sleeves that are readily available at most stores like Target and cost about two dollars.

Most of the journaling is done on the first page and the rest is on vellum so the pretty patterned paper would still show through. I am in love with the soft colors of the Meadow & Breeze line, and it was great being able to use up even the tiniest scraps for this project.

To plan out the book I picked my photos, cropped a few, and filled in the rest of the 4X6 space with paper scraps and travel themed stickers. I tried not to over think things and use mainly low profile embellishments. There is a lot of satisfaction getting a project started and done in a night. Plus now ER has something her little hands can flip through and that Mommy doesn't have to worry about her ripping or tearing.

This book is easy to make, so if you've been wanting to give scrapbooking a try this is a great first project. For a basic one, all you would need is 2-3 pieces of scrapbook paper and a package of stickers to match your theme. For the experienced scrapper, they're still fun projects because you can create one entirely out of stash items.