Review: Blurb.com

Our Blurb.com guest book arrived last week and I LOVE IT! It came in about 7-10 days and turned out just the way we wanted. The price was pretty reasonable, around $50 and I found a coupon online for $7 off which basically canceled out the shipping charges. Our book was a little time consuming because we had 4 different page layouts of the frames and I had to drag and drop each page into the book. But it didn't take more than an hour or so to do that part and I was fortunate enough to have my talented fiance design the frame pages. We opted for the image wrap over the dust jacket, it looks so professional!

There are large frames for the Polaroids to go into, we are planning to attach photo corners so it makes it very easy for the guests. Then there are smaller frames where they can write a short message. I can't wait to see how it all turns out after the big day. I would highly recommend Blurb to anyone who wants a more simple looking guest book or photo album.

Here is a teeny peek of the cover.

Photo Props

According to the Knot my budget for a guest book was around $75, between the two vintage Polaroid cameras, the packs and packs of Polaroid film, sharpies, we have spent...well let's just say a lot more than $75. Since we are having our second photographer take the Polaroid pics I had the genius idea of getting props too. Here are some we picked up over the weekend, I actually got some good deals on these and my fiance made the Bears hat (channeling Bill Murray) last year. If you know anywhere to get fun vintage or just silly hats on the cheap please let me know! I am thinking hitting up some after Halloween sales in October might be a good place to look.

I am also thinking of getting a few of these from Etsy seller Lupin, so fun.

(prop photos taken by my adorable fiance)

Project DIY: Episode 3

Episode 3: Guest Book

Why does it seem all the guests books out there are the wrong color, too frilly, boring, plain? So we were forced to come up with our own idea. We are going to use Blurb.com to create a nice, more modern guest book that will fit in with our other art and design books.

I first found out about Blurb from a Lucky magazine article which I posted about back in January. I thought this could be a good idea, and then I found the post on Brklyn Bride about the frames wallpaper. I loved this wallpaper! Since we do not have enough room to hang a huge board of the paper ( though I love that idea and think someone should definitely use it) we compromised and are using these pages as the pages for our Blurb book. The idea is for guests to write their notes inside one of the frames. We are supplying the most beautiful array of Sharpies I have ever seen and also Polaroids. So they could also take their picture , write a note on the bottom and tape it inside one of the frame boxes. I am so excited to see how this turns out and we hope to make another Blurb book of our wedding pictures. For us a nice, hardcover book is much more practical than a huge wedding album or a book with simply guest's names written in it.

The cost of creating your own Blurb book is $30-75 depending on the shape you choose and number of pages, which is comparable to a store bought guest book. Plus we get to design the book jacket/cover which will be so fun! Ease level: Very Easy (Blurb site has step by step instructions and is very user friendly).

Farewell Polaroid!

I went to Target today to purchase my Polaroid film since they just announced they are no longer making it. I figure there won't be any in sight come May 2009 so I'd best be buying it now. My fiance assures me that even though the film I bought expires 3/09 that the film will still work, there will just be variances in the color which he thinks actually looks better so score! I still have to bid on a camera on eBay since no store I know of still sells the cameras. So anyone else wanting to use Polaroids for their guest book or any other fun project go get some now!