Mini-Album

So because my mom's birthday (50!!!) and Mother's day was so close, we decided to do something extra special this year.

And because we're so awesome, we went to Idaho to visit her for Memorial Day Weekend. She had no idea. It was awesome. I'll post about that soon.

But I didn't want to go empty handed--I mean, it was her 50th Birthday AND Mother's Day and flowers we sent weren't going to cut it. So I came up with a couple of cute things for her. And yes, of course, they involve pictures of Rachel. This is one of the little projects. I'll post the other one soon.

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The first project I put together is a mini-folding album of pictures of Rachel for Mom to keep in her purse (I also made Caitlin one).

I used little clear plastic playing card cases that I found in the dollar section at Michaels. I took the playing cards out and tossed them in with my games.

Then I measured the inside of the smaller (bottom) piece to make sure the paper would fit. The dimensions were 2.25" wide by 3.5" long.

I found some cute cardstock in my stash and cut long strips that were the same width as the plastic card holder (2.25"). I measured the strip and marked off "pages" every 3.5". I then folded the paper accordion style and sharpened the folds with a bone folder. Because I wanted 16 "pages" I made sure there were 9 pages on each side (so that there was a cover and a back page). The strips of cardstock weren't long enough so I attached them to each other using my trusty Tape Gun. (LOVE that thing!)

I cut out all the adorable pictures of my adorable niece and then decorated all the mini pages on both sides using the adorable pictures and other cute embellishments I had lying around.

When I was finished decorating, I used my tape gun to put adhesive on top of the front and back pages (they're still visible since the plastic is clear) and stuck them to the case pieces.

To finish it up, I used a cute ribbon to tie a little bow to hold it all together. Ta Da!