Sharing Memories - Donald
Level: Easy to Medium
This album was made to give to a very special guy, Donald. His mother was one of my best friends in Jr. High and High School. She was a few years older than me, and had gotten married and had him when I was 15 years old. When Donald was 10 months old, a drunk driver hitting them head on killed both of his parents. He had been left at home with an Uncle while his mom picked his dad up from work. I spent a lot of time with him for the next three years, and will forever remember that. When Donald was about 5 years old, his grandparent's house completely burned down and he was left with nothing to remember his parents by. In having Connie as a friend, I had a few pictures of her, some of Leroy, and lots of Donald as a little kid. I made this album as he turned 21 so that he would have some of that history back. He told me he looks at it every day, and has even found out his Aunt had a couple more pictures of his parents that he has stuck in the back. I am very glad to have had something to give him of his mom, and that he appreciated it so much.
Materials:
7x7 Album
All pictures of a particular person or time
Various papers — both printed and solid
Various stickers — words, letters, numbers, items
Photo adhesive
Various journaling pens
Scissors and/or paper trimmer
Corner rounder
Shape Cutters (oval, circle, etc)
Computer and color printer
Step 1:
Using your computer, type up a statement to place on the first page. The statement could explain the "why" of doing this album for this person. For me, this was a very personal statement and explained how much it meant to have him in my life. You can print this statement out in whatever color and/or font that will enhance the album cover or theme.
Step 2:
Trim the statement to fit the front page and attach using photo adhesive. This should be the first thing the recipient sees when they open the album.
Step 3:
Gather all the pictures you have of a particular person or time. Arrange the pictures in some kind of order, whether it is chronological or just personal preference of order. For Donald's book, I put the pictures of him in the front and back, and pictures of his mom and dad in the middle pages.
Step 4:
Group the pictures for how you would want the pages to look like, or for what picture or pictures you want to have on each page. Use scissors and/or shape cutter to crop the photos. If you have cut straight edges, use the corner rounder to round all corners.
Step 5:
Using the different papers you have available, pick which backgrounds you want to go with each group of photos. This is also the time to decide if you want to have the photos matted and if so, which papers to use for that. I tried to do each 2-page spread completely different from the others, but you may choose to do a similar layout, or color theme, through the whole album.
Step 6:
Go through and mount the background papers and then the photos (whether matted or not) to the pages using photo adhesive. I left the middle page — front and back — blank for my Step 8 inclusion.
Step 7:
After the photos have been mounted, go through and journal on the pages using your various pens and/or stickers. I used both pens and word stickers for my journaling.
Step 8:
Again using your computer and color printer, type up specific memories you have regarding the person or time you have highlighted in the album. I told of specific things that Connie and I did as friends and how I felt having Connie as my friend. Print this out using whichever color and font works best. I had enough written up that I printed this out in two different sheets so I could mount to the front and back of that middle page I left blank.
Step 9:
Use photo adhesive to mount typed pages to the album pages. I used the front and back of the middle page of this album to mount the memories. I had pictures opposite of both sides reflecting Connie and Leroy, both with and without Donald.
