I Love You Because…

So a few years ago my mom turned 30 for the 2nd time and all of us kids made her this card that was titled “we love you because…”.  Ok, ok I made the card but I enlisted the help of my siblings (there are 7 of us) to make it extra special.  In my family we all love each other tons but none of us have ever been good at sharing our feelings or saying it out loud.  I guess our actions have always talked louder than words.  For my mom though, I wanted her to know really how much she means to all of us and I wanted to say all that mushy-gushy stuff before another 30 years go by and I regret that I never did.

I asked my brothers and sisters to finish the sentence “mom, i love you because…”  Each sibling had to come up with 8 responses.  They could be sappy and mushy, silly, long or short – there were no rules.  I was blown away by the response I got.  There were definitely some silly ones and there were also some very heartfelt tear jerkers.  The coolest thing was reading each persons response as they would email them back to me and seeing the similarities.  Each of us kids learned alot of the same lessons from my mom.  I have 3 sisters and every single one of use wrote (in similar but different words) that we love our mom because she taught us by example how to be a good wife.  I mean how cool is that?  All seven kids wrote “because you are the best cook ever!” ha ha and leave it to my little brother to write something about because she let him have the old washing machine box to play with in the back yard???

So we all got together for mom’s birthday that year and gave her the card (It was an accordian style card with all typed responses in different fonts for each person.  It took me f-o-r-e-v-e-r to make!).  She read it and passed it around for all of us to read and it was just the sweetest thing ever.  My mom rarely cries – like never, but I saw tears in her eyes that night.

We decided to do the same thing for my Dad for Father’s Day that year.  Again, similar responses and just made me all warm and fuzzy inside knowing we were giving him the best gift ever.  My dad has a huge heart and he’s so kind.  He couldn’t even read the card while we were all there because his emotions were so high.

Both cards are proudly displayed on a shelf in their family room.  Not really on display, but you know, out in the open on the top shelf of a short bookcase so anyone visiting might happen to see and my mom and dad can say “oh that, have a look, it’s just something our kids made us”.

The following year we did this for my husband’s mom and dad for Mother’s Day and again for Father’s Day.  This time though I made the cards using an old altoid tin and patterned paper from the craft store.  The prep time was cut down to about 20 minutes and instead of me typing out all the responses, I just had the siblings write their own reasons on the back of the cards (in acid free ink).  Again, the gifts were loved and treasured.  I think the best thing about this gift is it makes the giver feel just as good as the receiver.

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Here’s a picture of my dad when he opened his card (I cut out circles in patterend paper, then typed all the responses and printed on white card stock, cut those in smaller circles and adhered one per patterend disc.  I put an eyelet in each disc and strung them with a ball chain).

DIY: Recipe Book

This year for Christmas I decided to make each family member a recipe book filled with our favorite family recipes.  I asked everyone to contribute at least one recipe – whether it’s a recipe they created or just one of their favorites.  Of course my mom will be contributing the most recipes (so fun to see how many of my brothers and sisters asked her to include the same old casserole type recipes from our childhood).  While waiting for the recipes to come back I got to work on the other components…

1. First I found some cute little 4×6 cloth covered albums from Target.  I bought 11 of them in the orange and red colors.

2. Then I browsed through the shop at Oscraps and found the perfect digital scrapbooking kit to use- “at home” by paislee press (available at oscraps).

3. Then I created my title card and all the recipe cards using my Recipe Templates (the doodled line version).  Here are just a few samples:

(this squash casserole is one of those “i can’t believe this soooo good and it doesn’t even have cheese in it” casseroles.  Yum!

4. I uploaded them to Persnickety Prints for printing because

• They’re the best.  Hands down their quality and customer service cannot be beat.
• Their photo prints are waterproof and I’m thinking this might come in handy with recipe cards.

I ordered on a Tuesday so I could take advantage of the 4×6 special they run on Tuesdays ($ .19 each).

5. Next with my recipe cards in hand, I went to my local Roberts Craft store and searched for something to embellish the front of the album with that would also coordinate with the recipe cards.  I found some thick chipboard buttons by Jenni Bowlen and some stick-on dressed up flowers by Sassafrass.

So now I’ve got my albums, recipe cards, embellishments and some thread to sew the embellishments to the elastic band on the album.

6. I sewed the chipboard button to the elastic band of the album (had to make sure I lined it up on the right side of the band).

7. Then I inserted all my cute recipe cards, making sure no two patterns were next to each other.

I just love how it all turned out.

All said and done it cost about $15 for each Recipe Book.
Breakdown as follows:

• $3.99 DIY Recipe Book Templates No 1 (the doodled line version) by Biograffiti @ Oscraps (or save 50% when you purchase the collection)
• OR you can purchase the Quickie version that uses the same digital kit “at home” from paislee press as shown above for $4.99
• $43.89 for 11ea Photo Albums (4×6) from Target
• $108.68 for 572 prints from Persnickety Prints ($ .19 each)
• $2.99 for one package of chipboard buttons
• $7.98 for two packages of decorated stick on flowers
• Total cost for 11 recipe books $167.53
• Total cost for ONE recipe book $15.23

One quick note… For a less expensive version you could substitute the following:
Instead of a cloth covered album you could use one of those plastic 4×6 photo flipper type albums.  Target usually has these for around $2.99 each.  You’d want to remove the stock image they put on the cover and use your Recipe title card as the cover of the album and a 4×6 card with just a paper pattern as the back of the album.  I don’t think these hold as many photos either so costs could be saved there.  In addition you don’t have to embellish the album like I did.  If using the photo flipper album a simple ribbon tied around the album would dress it up just fine.