Portrait of a Lady Flip Book Flip Thru
Hey there!
I am sooo excited to share my mom's Mother's Day gift with you. I have been planning this gift for two months. I saw the Graphic 45's Portrait of a Lady paper kit and got excited!
I purchased most of the tools a month before I began putting everything together. I purchased the Graphic 45 Rectangle Tag & Pocket Album. I do admit now that being lazy and taking the easy way out was a mistake. You'll see throughout the pictures and on the video at the end, it was difficult to decorate this book and might be difficult to add pictures and journaling to this book. The construction makes the book stiff and the pages don't open wide. The book itself isn't flat. That doesn't take away my love for the project though. I just know that I will probably not use this type of album again.
I used a good 75% of the paper pad, sticker pad and I added cutouts from my stash. The floral and greenery are perfect for my mom. The ladies in the book are beautiful and I am very glad that they had several women of color throughout.
For the spine I used some stretchy lace as a background and peach rosette lace on top. I added a crooked row of pearls to complete the spine. I thought about charms and extra embellishments but once I realized that the book wasn't going to lay flat, I didn't want to add anything else that would prevent the book from opening as far as it did.
Most of my prep time was spent cutting out the portraits and fussy cutting journaling spots and flowers. Man, did I spend a lot of time cutting flowers! I'm not a fan of fussy cutting anyway but I cut out a ton of flowers! Well worth it though. Well worth it.
I do love the pockets and tags that the album comes with. I used the same paper and ribbon on each tag for uniformity. Mom can use those as picture spots and the second side of the pocket for receipts, tickets subs, etc.
From my embellishment stash I pulled doilies and flowers and pearls. I tucked them behind photo mattes and journaling spots. In case I haven't explained what a journaling spot is, it's just a pretty place to write a note. You can write about the picture adjoining the spot or a memory that you have. Everyone in my family writes so my mother will find plenty of uses for these spots.
I mentioned that there are several pictures of women of color. Sometimes when you make gifts you want them to reflect the receiver. My mother certainly reminds me of the dainty women in this collection. They are all in elegant poses and look like they are shy but very sweet. That's definitely my mom!
Lace! I didn't know I loved lace until I started collecting items for this project. Lace is beautiful! It's dainty but strong. It really does change a plain page! I will use lace a lot more (especially since I bought quite a bit of it).
I know that you peek inside this book and see all those tiny spots for pictures. Why are the spots so tiny?? Well, cause the book is tiny! Don't worry. I can explain to mom how she can print off tiny pictures. Some people will use apps to print them out at home but you can go to your local photo printing place (I use Walgreens because it's close to my house) and use those same apps to create smaller photos. Or, you can cut pictures down and only capture the part of the image that you want to showcase.
The book itself is a pretty bookshelf piece (in my humble opinion) but once mom fills it with her memories it will be something that I hope she looks at time and time again.
Have you ever created a flip book? Are you interested in making one? If so, check out YouTube for some tutorials and let me know what you think!
