So lately, it seems that everyone is talking about mini books. My pal Mandi has an amazing mini book tutorial on her blog (I can't get over the oh-so-cool photos of her process.) Jamaica makes made some of my all-time favorite little books ever. Elise has really been on a roll lately. And you must see this post by Christina Clouse where she lays down the master list of some of the best mini books ever made.
Because of Christina's post, I decided to upload all my mini book photos that I had on my hard drive to Flickr, where I could see them and organize them into little groups. I'm so funny about making little books. There are so many of them in my house. It seems that when I'm done making one, I just throw it on the shelf and wonder if its pages will ever see the light of day again. Sometimes I wonder why I keep making them.
But then I think about the content. The range of subjects I have documented. I made a pregnancy book, and a twenty-page book for Lotus containing detailed notes I took about her babyhood, every single month of her first year. There's a book called 'I have to confess' (a free class by Shimelle) that dishes a bunch of my secrets and embarrassing traits. 'Life' has some of the funniest every-day little stuff that I've ever written about. I have a few little books dedicated to music; one about growing up on mtv in the 80s/90s and another with obscure song lyrics called 'Words to Live By.'
But even if I wanted to stop making mini books, I don't think I could. The subjects you can cover never end. There's huge appeal in knowing that you can finish a book in one night. (Okay, it might be a late night.) It's the perfect way to document a trip, a year, a season, a list or random stories and facts that you want to keep forever. Even if they do end up on a shelf for x amount of time.
Someday, you'd have to hope that they will end up in the lap of that potential someone who may love paging through and reading all of the random things you wrote. I was that sentimental kid, sitting around boxes of old photos at my grandparents' house and wanting to take home the old Sears Roebuck catalog they kept in their closet. I looked at the backs of every single photo to read the notes and dates and learned to distinguish the difference between my mother's and grandmother's handwriting. I was fascinated by a tin box of things my dad had collected when he was serving in the Army as a medic in Korea when he was just 17-18 years old. Those things were my favorite treasures.
So really. When you laugh at yourself for spending an evening making scrapbook pages, consider that it may not be so pointless after all. You just may inspire some young future person to do the same, three or more generations away. (It's also possible that everything you make will be destroyed by a natural disaster, thrown out or put in a box and never seen again. But I think we're all aware of those risks and continue in good faith. Ha.)
Anyway, here are the WINNERS of the giveaway mix CDs from the last post...
YAY! Kristen W., Je, Sheri and Jamie – email me your mailing addys to jgeigley [at] gmail [dot] com and I'll get these sent off soon. Thanks for playing; this was so much fun.