Father's Day Bouquet

For Father's Day Jason received a bouquet of fresh "flowers." The flower tops are "fun-sized" butterfingers, the stems are colored pencils hot glued to the butterfingers (I should have used green instead of blue!), and the decorative "pebbles" are milk duds. I think this would work with whatever the favorite candy is of the father in question!

Collage.com Photo Book Review

*I was provided with a free hardcover and softcover photo book from Collage.com to do this review. The opinions I write below are my own. :)*

A while ago the photo company Collage contacted me and asked if I'd like to review their "One-Click Photo Books." Being the photo book nut that I am, I immediately said yes. :) So I used Collage's website to make and order two books, and I have to tell you, I really really liked their software! Making these photo books was probably the easiest photo book making process I've ever had.

I was able to make two books with Collage: a 11.5"x8.5" hardcover (the same size and format I usually order from Shutterfly) and a 8"x6" softcover. For the hardcover, I decided to make a Christmas present book with some of my favorite pictures from the last year. I chose the pictures and uploaded them to Collage's site, and then clicked their "auto place" button. The "auto place" button immediately placed all the pictures in the book, and gave me an option to make a collage on the cover using all of the pictures. I clicked "yes" to that option, it made the cover - and my book was done! It was seriously that easy. I did rearrange a couple of the pictures on the pages, but that only took a few minutes. I was pretty satisfied with how it put them automatically and there wasn't much to do.

One thing I loooove about Collage's software and wish every photo book company had in their software was what I found when I rearranged pictures on the pages. When I would click and drag a picture, the page would shift around, giving me lots of options for the layout while maintaining each picture's original aspect ratio (shape). One thing I don't like about Shutterfly is that if I want to maintain each picture's aspect ratio (keep it portrait or landscape, and make it show the whole picture), I have to customize each layout that I'm working with. It's really time consuming. I absolutely love that on Collage it maintains the aspect ratio for each picture, and still has a lot of layouts for each page that are so easy to switch between! It's seriously amazing! I know I sound ridiculous, but I seriously love love love Collage's software when it comes to page layouts. It is the best, and so easy.

Okay, so here are the books. Here is the 11.5"x8.5" hardcover:

 Close-up of the cover collage:

 Some of the inside pages (it's a standard, 20-page book):

 And the back, which is white with a small "Collage.com" logo in the middle:

Collage has different background options that you can apply to individual pages or the whole book, but I chose white for the whole book because I just like white. The picture quality is good (though perhaps not quite as sharp as Shutterfly), and the paper quality is good. I did miss the paper end pages that you find in Shutterfly's books or MyPublisher's - the Collage book starts right in on the picture pages without end pages. The binding seems good and secure.

Here's the 8"x6" softcover. For this book, I chose a bunch of pictures of family members, and made it as a kind of "Where's Waldo?" of family for the girls to play with. When it came and I gave it to Toddler, it was an instant hit. She sat on the couch and went through each page, naming each family member. It was just the right size for her to open and look at herself. She carried it around all day, and even insisted on going to sleep with it that night. :)

The two sizes compared (The 8"x6" softcover vs the 11.5"x8.5" hardcover):

And the inside:

So, Collage.com's One-Click Photo Books in a nutshell: I looooved the software. I don't think I can emphasize that enough. This was some of the easiest, best photo book software I have ever worked with. Making a book literally only took a few minutes, and rearranging pictures was so easy that it was fun. Whoever made Collage's software knew what they were doing.

The books themselves are good quality. Again, I wish that the hardcover had endsheets - they're such a good feature! - but the pictures and pages themselves were good quality, and the binding was tight.

If you'd like to check out Collage.com's photo books (or any of their other products - they also make photo blankets, calendars, canvases, etc.), click here: Collage.com.


To see my other photo book reviews, check out the posts below:

Shutterfly Photo Book Review
Shutterfly Premium Leather Layflat Photo Book Review
Shutterfly Calendar Review
York Photo Photo Book Review
AdoramaPix Photo Book Review
MyPublisher Photo Book Review
Photo Book Comparisons

MyPublisher Photo Book Review

I don't get it. I've seen numerous conversations on the web comparing Shutterfly and MyPublisher, and it seems like the people with the strongest opinions are always those who like MyPublisher better.

I don't like MyPublisher.

I've tried to like MyPublisher. I really have. I've made two photo books with them. The first was our family's "2010" year book, and the second was a Christmas present for my sister last year. I just really really don't like working with their software. It's a program that you download to your computer. You assemble the photo book offline, then order it and upload it to their website.

Software faults:

• Customization is annoying. To change the location of photos or text on the page, you have to drag the photo box with your mouse. You cannot inch it along with the arrow keys on the keyboard. Because you have to drag it, you cannot be extremely accurate - you have the limitations of screen size and mouse dexterity. It's hard to get things to line up properly.
• There's a huge lack of background choices, themes, and frames. You're very limited in your choices.
• Some layouts, if they're part of a theme, are locked and cannot be customized. There's no reason given or any logic in this, it's just how it is. Some layouts, seemingly at random, just can't be altered.

Additionally, the order process is backward. You make your order first, and then you upload your book to their website. (Remember, you create the book in a program on your computer, not on the internet). This arrangement - ordering before uploading - opens the ordering process up to error and frustration. What if you order the book, and the order goes through, but then the book does not upload? You've already purchased the book, and now it can't be uploaded? It makes far more sense to upload the book first, and then place orders.

Other things I don't like about MyPublisher:

• Shipping is expensive.
• Several pages printed unexpectedly dark.
• You can't order different books at the same time; just multiple copies of the same book.
• Their deals aren't great. They often have a "buy one get one free" deal going on, but it's for two copies of the same book. And I don't need two copies. I just want one discounted copy. The best deal I have found for them that comes up occasionally is through Photobook Girl. She will sometimes have a code where you can get up to 70 extra pages free - and pages usually cost $1 each. So you can get a 100 page book for $35 (plus the ridiculous $12 shipping. That's $3 more for shipping than Shutterfly charges for exactly the same size book).

Anyway, with all that said, the book itself is pretty good. I got the "layflat pages" option and that turned out really cool. Here's the "2010" book that I ordered from them:

Nice cover - I like that the picture stretches all the way to the spine. I wish they had more cover layout options, though. They didn't have very many.

The inside has a nice gray end sheet and then a nice vellum cover page:

Here's one of the couple pictures that printed unexpectedly dark - and it stinks that it's the front page. On my computer, Jason was bright and easily seen. In the book, he's very dark. I know that if I had printed this with Shutterfly, Jason would have printed brighter and much closer to what I saw on my screen. I've never had problems with pictures printing dark with Shutterfly - and so was surprised when it happened a couple times in this MyPublisher book. 

Here's an example of  a layout (note how flat the pages are):

 Another view of how flat the pages are:

Here's another problem I had - the words were cut off here. This one was probably my fault; I'm guessing I ignored some warning or something. But I was surprised when I saw it. In Shutterfly, I definitely know when I'm ignoring their warnings - they make it obvious and remind me like three times. In this book, I don't remember ignoring the warning (although I bet there probably was one).

Some more layouts:

 Another example of how flat the pages are:

The back cover (again, I like how the picture stretches all the way across):

The spine. The one fault with the cover pictures running all the way to the spine is that it makes the spine look kind of funky, because you can see the front and back covers next to the white spine even when the book is on the shelf. (Instead of just seeing the white spine with words.) Maybe it looks more normal if you order a 20-page book, and they just didn't adjust spine width for a 100-page book? I'm not sure, but the spine looks a little funny to me when the book is on the shelf:

Paper quality: Excellent

Binding: Excellent. I got the layflat pages, and think they turned out really cool. Plus, the binding is nice and strong.

Print quality: Very good, except for the couple pictures that turned out unexpectedly dark.

Price: With the deal I got (free pages), I did save quite a bit - it was like $35 + $12 shipping for a 100 page book. So, not bad. But the expensive shipping is ridiculous. It doesn't need to be that much. And I don't like how most of their deals are "buy one get one free" of the same book. I don't need two copies of the same book. I just want one, cheaper book.

Sorry, this turned out way more negative than I was planning! I want to reiterate that I do like the book. I just don't like working with the software. But the book itself is very good, with just a few minor faults. Overall, I'd recommend MyPublisher, especially if you don't mind their software and the price is okay for you.

To see my other photo book reviews, check out the posts below:

Shutterfly Photo Book Review
Shutterfly Premium Leather Layflat Photo Book Review
Shutterfly Calendar Review
York Photo Photo Book Review
AdoramaPix Photo Book Review
Collage.com Photo Book Review
Photo Book Comparisons

Finished Bookshelf

Do you remember the pictures last week of Jason building a bookshelf? Here's a reminder:

Well, it's all done and painted and filled with books. Here's the finished product!

I loooove it! If you follow me on Pinterest, you've probably seen on my "Playroom" board where I've pinned a million pictures of rain-gutter bookshelves or flat display bookshelves. I really like how they make it so the kids can see the front of the books. It makes it way easier for the books to catch their interest and for them to choose one to read.

Jason did such a good job building this bookshelf and I love the way it fits into our playroom. We used these free plans from Ana White, slightly modifying them for our space. In addition to the natural lean built into the bookshelf, we secured it to a stud in the wall.

I plan to change out the books almost every day, with books from the bookshelf in their room and the bookshelves in the office. Also, we decided that this is a really good place to keep the girls' library books, because it keeps them all in one place and they'll be able to access and read them easily.

And that's our new, home-built bookshelf!

York Photo Photobook Review

Hi everyone! It's been a while since I did a review of a photo book company, but I've got a couple lined up that I want to do - MyPublisher, York Photo, Blurb - so let's just get started!

Last autumn I saw a deal for the company York Photo. I'd never used them before, but Christmas was coming up and they had some cute themes for their photo books, including an Instagram theme. My stepsister MaCall posts lots of cute pictures on Instagram, and when I saw the Instagram theme I instantly thought of her and knew that's what I wanted to do for her and her husband Aaron for Christmas.

I picked a time frame for the book so that I could choose the right amount of pictures (I chose "Fall 2012"), saved all the pictures on my computer, and then uploaded them into York Photo's software (which is all online through their site), and put the book together over a couple days.

Here are a couple pictures of the cover, some of the inside pages, and the binding:

I was really pleased with how it turned out. Having never used York Photo before, I didn't know what to expect. Also, it was a softcover, and I usually only do hardcovers, so I was wondering how that would turn out too. But it was really good! Good quality paper, cover, binding, and printing.

The one downside of York Photo was that I found the software somewhat hard to work with. Sometimes it would run very, very slow. Additionally, the backgrounds were sorted into kind of weird categories and you couldn't search for one type of backgrounds - all the blue ones, for example, or stripes, or whatever. You just kind of had to browse through everything to find what you wanted. But, I did make the book almost a year ago now, and they might have improved their software since then.

So that was my experience with York Photo in a nutshell. The software was somewhat hard to work with, but the book turned out nicely.

To see my other photo book reviews, check out the posts below:

Shutterfly Photo Book Review
Shutterfly Premium Leather Layflat Photo Book Review
Shutterfly Calendar Review
MyPublisher Photo Book Review
AdoramaPix Photo Book Review
Collage.com Photo Book Review
Photo Book Comparisons

Nephew's Quiet Book

I'm posting this over on my Quiet Book Blog today, so I thought I should share it here, too!

Back in April and May when my brother Banks and my sister Alyse and their families were visiting California, my nephew had his first birthday! For his birthday present, I made him a quiet book.

Something I did with this quiet book - and I really really love how it turned out - is I sewed it a cover. I cut a big piece of fabric out of a soft, old t-shirt, then sewed the first and last pages directly on to that fabric (turning in the edges so that it's a nice clean line). I sewed the two middle pages back to back, then sewed the edge of that back-to-back page to the middle of the inside of the cover. So, the whole book is all connected and one piece, and the cover is nice and soft!

Anyway, I'll quiet rambling. Here's Nephew's quiet book!

The individual pages:

The binding and cover:

If you'd like to see my other quiet books, you can click here: The Quiet Book Round-up!, the Butterfly Book, and Two New Quiet Book Pages.

My other nephew's birthday is this week, too...I guess I have to get busy, haha! ;)