Wednesday, January 19, 2011

My Blog Books

One of the things I put on my Christmas wish list this past year was my blog printed in book form. Since I've been maintaining this blog since 2007, I decided to have each year printed in its own book. I received 2007 and 2008 for Christmas, and 2009 for my birthday.One of the reasons I wanted them was to have a history of sorts of our life. I blog about random things and important things, and I think this will be something pretty cool to have way down the road. Especially when Kate it grown, she can go back through and read them and have a pretty good idea of who Mommy was when she was her own age. That in and of itself made it important for me to have. I also have scrapbooked in ages, like since sometime in 2009. I guess it's one of those hobbies that fell by the wayside when I got pregnant and then especially once Kate was here. But I've maintained my blog through it all, and really more so than before now that Kate is here. So in a way, these blog books kind of take the place of scrapbooking. Of course that doesn't mean I won't ever scrapbook again, but for now I'm not "behind" like I might have felt before.

Back to the books. We ordered them through blog2print.com. They had several covers to choose from and allowed you to choose one photo for the front cover along with your title. They even print along the spine of the books which is really handy for when they are sitting on the bookshelf.
The printing inside is really pretty and the quality is very professional. One of the things I was unsure about was the quality, having never seen one in person, but I am really pleased with how they look. Even the photos look nice.
With the 2007 and 2008 books, I chose the compact design to save on the number of pages, without considering how that might compromise the photo placement. That was a mistake on my part, because that format compacts everything with all the pictures to the side or doubled up, like you see in the photo above. Yes, it saved several pages from each book thereby causing the price to go down, but a lot of my posts are not formatted in a way that makes sense based on how I typically type to go along with my pictures. So, for my 2009 book, I chose to format it exactly as my blog appears online, as you can see below. This meant an additional 40 pages or so were added to the book, which meant that it was pretty expensive (about $90), but it looks exactly like my blog appears online and everything flows the way I meant for it too.
My only complaint about the books, and it's a minor complaint at that, other than the hideous barcode on the back cover which I guess they have to have, is that the covers are glossy in appearance. I would much prefer a matte cover, but really this doesn't affect the book quality; it's just a personal preference.
So if you are at all considering having your blog printed, I would recommend it. I love mine and will definitely be purchasing each year as they happen. I need to add 2010 to my collection now. Maybe an anniversary gift? We will see!

2 comments:

Jamie said...

I love them!

Anonymous said...

Gorgeous! I go through blogs like candy, and have changed and dropped and deleted so many, it would be horrendous for me to try and do this... but I love the concept, and think they're beautiful, brandi!