No matter how old your children are, creating a memory book is a wonderful way to celebrate a special occasion or commemorate a holiday like Christmas, a birthday, or an anniversary. Every year since my daughter was born, I’ve made a Christmas memory book for my husband. The book outlines what we’ve done that year or it is a record of what my daughter would like to create. It contains her artwork, her stories, and pictures of our family.
I don’t scrapbook. This doesn’t mean I’m anti-scrapbooking – I commend and look in awe upon the people who do it. However, I am not particularly detail-oriented, and scrapbooking just sounds like pain to me. I do like to commemorate my daughter’s life and the life of our family, though, and I like to do it in a way that is a little more than a photo album.
Memory books do require a digital camera and they require some photo editing. If you want your child to place artwork and stories in the book, they also require some patience. This year we are making a collage photo book that features one of my daughter’s stories. We’ve made collage backgrounds and she has drawn art work to illustrate the story.
If you want to create a simple paperback memory book for a christening, wedding, graduation or birthday party, online photo book programs like Kodak allow you to upload your photos to a site or download software to organize your photos. This takes just about all of the pain out of creating a scrapbook. The beauty of the online memory book is that you can print as many books as you want – they’re ideal family gifts for grandparents or those who don’t really want a lot of “stuff” for Christmas.
Memory books take at least six to eight weeks to ship, so now is the time to create one for Christmas time.