Baby Books

I need a better way to document the little bean. She is now 6 months and I follow her around like the paparazzi. I’m realizing I need to do a better job of displaying and organizing her photos. I currently have a family album for 2013, two baby books and a Smash Book of her. Did I mention she’s only been alive for 6 months? I need to simmer down.

I like having two baby books for her so I can give one to her if she is ever interested. They also have different questions, so there’s hardly any repeated info between the two. In these books I’ve kept her shower invite, sonogram, growth chart, doctor visits, firsts and there’s room for her first 5 bday pictures.

I make our family albums through Shutterfly, after the new year, when there are major discounts. The books usually are still in the range of $50-$70, which I think is a lot, but I think having those memories documented is important. Two tips about Shutterfly I’ve learned over the years: If you get a coupon in the mail that expires in a few weeks/months, sign in to add the code and it will save it for whenever you make your album. Also, if you buy a premium background, you can use boarders, stickers and layouts from ALL of the different themes. So you might pay an extra $3 for a specific theme but get access to everything. Warning: this makes the project take about 10 times longer since there are more options. 😉 I also like making books online, opposed to scrapbooking, for albums of kids because if Grandma wants a copy, it’s much easier and faster to duplicate.

*Shutterfly does a good job of the quality of photos in the books. The picture on the left should not have been put in this 12×12 book because it was taken with my iPhone in a dark room…but I wanted it in there so don’t judge the quality by this shot.

I LOVE Smashbook because it’s a simplified version of scrap booking. I feel like it’s more organic. I don’t take as much time making sure pictures and colors go well together on each spread, but rather that all the photos are in order and put in the book. It’s more about having a book of photos to flip through that has a bit of embellishment rather than a full story like in a scrap book.

The bad thing about Smashing is the mess. Like scrapping, you can have as little or as many embellishments as you want. In my case, I use a LOT less when I smash but it still takes up a lot of space, as you may remember me mentioning here.

I was hoping this post would help me realize what method of baby books I liked most but it just made me want to work on my Smashbook. 😉 What’s your favorite version of a baby book? Do you like any photo companies better than Shutterfly? I’ve tried Snapfish and Tiny prints but still like Shutterfly better. Did you keep up with a baby book for your second child? I feel like it would be hard to do! If you have any posts or suggestions for ways to document baby memories, link them up, I wanna see!