Well, we’re back from our summer break from the blog. Hopefully you’ve had a great summer and took a lot of memorable photos. Whether you have kids starting school or just recently noticed your commute being delayed by those big annoying yellow buses that stop every 30 seconds, you know it is officially “Back to School” season.
Watching the little one head off to school is hard, but it’s also something to cherish. So whether this year was the very first day of school for your little munchkin or your teen drove to school for the first time, a photo book can be the perfect way to capture the memories. We’re celebrating the start of the new school year with great deals for everyone. Make a photo book to capture the excitement of the first day of school, a compilation book of all the First Days or even your summer vacation and get a second copy for half price.
That’s right. Make any photobook at Inkubook and order it by Monday, August 31, 2009 and get a second copy of the same book for half price. Just enter code SCHOOLDAYS during checkout. (Code may be used once per customer. Not valid with any other offer or promotion).
So get started today. It’s fun. It’s easy. And saving money is always smart.
It’s too late to make a photo book for mom but it’s not too late to order her an Inkubook gift card. Photo book gift cards make great gifts for moms who love to make digital scrapbooks & photo books. Just order online and you can have it sent electronically or print it out and put it in a card. It doesn’t get much easier than that.
We see hundreds of wickedly creative drop-dead gorgeous photo books every day at Inkubook. Lately we’ve noticed by the number of personalized wedding guest books being made that wedding season must be coming soon. One wedding guest book that really caught our attention was one created by the blogger of Budget Savvy Bride.
With permission from her talented Franklin, TN-based photographer Evin Photography, the Budget Savvy Bride used several gorgeous photos from her engagement shoot to create a custom-designed wedding guest book on Inkubook. The finished book was amazing. This bride-to-be definitely has style. She opted for a non-lined design allowing her guests to write messages freely throughout the book. Flip through her Inkubook photo book widget below to get some ideas for your own wedding guest book or pass it along to a friend on Facebook or MySpace who might be getting married this year. Just click the “Get Widget” button and follow the directions.
For those of you who have been pregnant or have lived with someone pregnant, you’re likely aware of the “nesting instinct” that sets in just before baby arrives. This instinct causes many women to make cleaning, shopping and organizing top priorities. At 39 weeks pregnant, I had cleaned everything, bought all that I could, and organized and reorganized every nook and cranny in the house. When there was nothing left to do, I came up with something … getting a jump-start on baby’s first photo book.
Baby photo books made at Inkubook are printed on 100 lb. archival-quality
silk paper, which means they will stand up to years of enjoyment.
When my first daughter was born two years ago, I made a baby photo book outlining our trip to the hospital, her birth, our time at the hospital, her first car ride and the first 72 hours at home, including her first bath on the kitchen counter. I finally got around to making that book when she was about 8 months old. I wish I had made that photo book sooner, when the events were fresher in my sleep-deprived mind.
This time would be different. This time, I had experience and a little inspiration from Laura, the professional organizer, mom of three and blogger of OrgJunkie on my side. Having made a baby photo book like this before, I already knew what sort of pictures I wanted to include. So, I logged on to Inkubook.com, and started the Simple Square baby photo book. The 8.5 square soft cover book fits nicely on a bookshelf and coffee table and in the diaper bag. I chose the Baby’s 1st Year theme. And in my super-organization state-of-mind, I began to lay out the photo book and write in some of the text I know I’ll want.
Photos you might want to include in your baby photo book:
- Mommy’s belly before and at hospital
- Cord cutting, hospital bath, bracelet
- Mommy, daddy, sibling, grandparents w/baby
- “Birth day” cake
- Car ride home
- First 72 hours at home – feeding, changing, napping, bath
After baby girl arrives and is finally taking a nap longer than 20 minutes, I’ll be able to upload all of the photos and place them in the book, share it with family and friends through Inkubook’s Invite Friends feature and order the photo book before she wakes for her next feeding. How’s that for organized?
Enhance your rugged travel photos with the
backgrounds from the Outdoor Adventure theme.
If you like outdoor activities like hiking, mountain biking, camping or fishing, you’re probably really looking forward to spring about now. It’s the time of year when the boat, sport and travel shows come to town and we’ve all had enough of the cold. As you gear up for spring it might just be the perfect time to break out the photos from last year’s camping trip and make a great travel and adventure themed photo book.
When we first started creating themes and collections of backgrounds for Inkubooks, we thought we had all our bases covered. We had a variety of family themes, kid themes, and travel themes, not to mention the more practical themes such as cookbook, business book, and portfolio. Then someone on the Inkubook team said, “Where’s the manly outdoors theme? You know…the one for people who like to hike and camp and stuff like that?” That’s when we realized that we’d overlooked the outdoor enthusiasts in the crowd, and we decided we’d better correct that situation PDQ.
Swatches from the Outdoor Adventure Theme
Hence the Outdoor Adventure theme was born. All of the backgrounds in this collection are clean and simple, so your photos can do the talking. This theme is inspired by the types of trail signs you might see in a state or national park and the color scheme runs toward the colors you’d find when shopping for gear at an outdoor outfitter: foresty green, earthy sand, and fiery orange (although it’s not quite fiery enough to be called blaze orange).
If your vacations and weekend getaways are about roughing it with a tent, an outdoor shower, and a camp stove instead of a down comforter, a whirlpool garden tub, and a five-star restaurant, this theme is for you. Look for it in the Travel category when you start a new book. (And if you prefer a more luxurious vacation, you might want to check into our other travel themes.)
A family cookbook can include favorite recipes,
family photos, and colorful backgrounds.
Almost every family has a collection of recipes that are staples either for nightly dinners or for special occassions. For example, a birthday in our family can’t pass without homemade deep dark chocolate cake with dark chocolate frosting. And even without all the recipes that have been passed down through the generations, there are new favorites that enter the rotation all the time, and it’s high time they were all collected in one place.
While it would be perfectly adequate to use Inkubook to create a cookbook that uses plain white on each of the pages, we thought it would be a little more exciting to design some attractive backgrounds to help set off recipes and photos. Whether you include photos of the family members who contributed the recipes, of the people who claim the recipes as their favorite dishes of all time, or of the prepared dishes themselves, having photos in your cookbook will make it more personal and visually interesting, and our backgrounds can enhance that.
Backgrounds from the Cookbook Collection
Backgrounds from the Fundraiser Cookbook Collection
Backgrounds from the Tailgating Cookbook Collection
We didn’t stop with only one collection of backgrounds, though, because we know that cookbooks can serve different purposes. First we have the collection that is simply called Cookbook. There’s no particular theme in this one other than it provides a nice splash of color to the pages. For a cookbook in which you want to divide the recipes according to main ingredient or type of dish, as when you make a cookbook to sell to raise money for a service organization or charity, we have the Fundraiser Cookbook collection. It features a series of attractive solid backgrounds that have just the hint of an image in the corners. Last, but certainly not least, is the Tailgating Cookbook collection, which features elements common to tailgating parties, picnics, and barbecues. Photos from your favorite sporting events and recipes that travel well in a cooler or without refrigeration will look great in a cookbook adorned with these backgrounds.
As always, we think you shouldn’t let us limit your creativity in making your cookbook. There’s no reason you can’t use backgrounds from all these collections in one book. Simply start by picking one of these themes from the Cookbook category when you start a new book, then use the Get More Backgrounds button to add other backgrounds to your gallery.
Well, it’s here, that part of winter that’s blisteringly cold and inhospitable. The time of year when it seems like going outdoors should be outlawed. One day the temperatures might be relatively mild, but the next is outrageously frigid. This is the type of weather that’s best for staying warm with a nice indoor activity.
Snow day memories can last forever in a gorgeous
winter-themed Inkubook photo book.
Call us predictable, but we’re going to give you a suggestion for an indoor activity, and you can probably guess what it is. When you’re snowbound (or just trapped inside because it’s significantly below freezing outside), it’s a good time to work on a photo book. With our collections of Winter and Contemporary Christmas backgrounds, you can pretend to be enjoying the seasonably cold temperatures without actually setting foot outside.
It’s a perfect time to organize your photos from the holidays and put them in a photo book adorned with our Contemporary Christmas backgrounds. As you can see from the swatches, the Contemporary Christmas theme says Christmas, but it does it by updating the look of traditional pine green and candy-cane red. The green is a little more muted and the red has more of a cranberry hue. Trees and ornaments have modern shapes and designs. If you prefer something a little more traditional, we still have the regular Christmas theme that includes more classic colors and patterns.
Inkubook Contemporary Christmas Theme
While it might be too cold to go sledding, ice skating, or snowman-building right now, it’s a good time to remember the last winter adventure you had by building a book with some frosty backgrounds. Designed with images and colors that evoke memories clear, crisp days full of sunshine and snow, the Winter theme looks adorable when framing photos of people joyously playing in the snow.
Inkubook Winter Theme
If the last thing you want to do is be faced with the imagery that makes you think of winter, don’t fear. We still have all the backgrounds that are reminiscent of warmer time, such as the Summer and Family Beach Vacation themes. You can turn your heat up to 88, put on a pair of shorts, sip a refreshing glass of iced tea, and focus on the history of last summer instead of the history of last month.
Holiday season 2008 is in the near distant past, but that doesn’t mean it’s too early to start thinking about what kind of special gift you might make for someone in 2009. In case you haven’t already thought about taking all your old traditional photos and putting them into a photo book, or in case you think it would be too difficult, it might be time for you to think about it a little more. Inkubook member Dick Fey made three books for his children and wrote us to say how pleased he was with them, so we asked Dick if he’d let us tell everyone a little about his experiences with Inkubook.
Dick is a semi-retired business ownder from Leawood, Kansas, which is a suburb of Kansas City. His plan had been to make DVD videos of old 8mm film for his children as a Christmas present. He sent many rolls of 30-year-old film to a company for professional transfer to digital format, and he also scanned lots of pictures himself. Then he made a video slide show and put it on DVDs. Once he got that part done he thought he was finished with his gift. Then he found Inkubook. Here’s what he had to say:
“I’d never heard of you, but your website looked interesting, so I decided to play with it a little. It was perfect timing, since I already had all the pictures readily available. I thought that perhaps having a ‘coffee table book’ of the pictures would be a perfect addition to the gift pack. I’d never made a picture book before–in fact I didn’t even know the technology existed. I found the website very easy to comprehend and use, and had a good time doing it.
Dick Fey and his children with their books.
“Initially I was concerned about quality; buying over the Internet when you can’t actually touch or feel the product is difficult, at least for me. I was pleasantly surprised when I began to receive the books. They were better than I had expected. Even pictures that Inkubook had marked as questionable came out OK.
“We gave our children the books for Christmas, and, boy, were they thrilled! I think the immediate gratification of the photo book was even more important to them than the videos.”
So whether you’re in the market for a good mid-winter activity to keep you busy or you want to get started on a present for holiday season 2009, think about scanning some of those old photos and putting them in a modern and attractive photo book. Dick Fey is happy he did, and you will be, too.
If there’s one thing that says fall and early winter, it’s football. As we wind down the fantasy football season, gear up for the play-offs in the NFL, and settle in to watch the bowl games, it seems like a perfect time to feature a football book created by Barbara Rodriguez, a parent of a youth football player.
Barbara used Inkubook to make a sports team photo book about her son’s football team. Books will be presented to each of the players at the banquet in January. Barbara captured all the hard-hitting action of the boys’ games, but she also took the opportunity to ask each player to reflect on his team and provide a little insight into what he likes best about it. We were very impressed with how Barbara laid out her book, so we asked her a few questions about the experience.
Q. What prompted you to make your sports team photo book with Inkubook?
A. I looked at a number of photo book sites, including MyPublisher, Shutterfly, and Smilebox…. Then I came across Inkubook. I had no idea of what I was doing. I wanted to talk to someone live. One day I stumbled into the sports book and found Quantity Orders. This was what I was looking for so I sent my info and Jessica [Inkubook's product marketing manager] called me. She was great and really worked with our needs. She actually gave me ideas for next year on how to help with the cost of the yearbook. The price was fantastic. I made an Ultimate Portrait hardcover for the head coach, and the Simple Square for the boys. I am already thinking about other books that I can do.
Q. What’s the age group of the boys on the team and how many played?
A. There were 25 boys ages 9 through 12.
Q. It’s funny that each of the boys had a nickname. How did those come about?
A. At one practice during the season after they all got to know each other, the coaches had the kids come up with nicknames for each other. The kids had to all agree. It was quite entertaining.
Each player had the opportunity to write a statement about his favorite things about being on the team.
Q. Why did you create the book?
This was driven from the head coach. He wants the boys to have memories. His family is very involved. They have five kids, so the first yearbook was done by his oldest son, who is now in college. The coach calls them his treasures.
Q. Did you take all the pictures in the book yourself?
A. I took all the pictures myself–my first time with a camera. I guess that’s how I was chosen to do the photo album. I’m glad that everyone went along with the online idea.
Q. What was your favorite part about making the book?
Looking back at the season. I also enjoyed choosing the layouts. I know the boys will love the books.
The book includes a two-page spread with pictures
and scores from each of the games.
Q. Do you have any tips that you’d offer to other people who want to make a team book like this?
A. With digital, there are so many photos to go through. Pick the top 10 photos after each game and set them aside in a folder.
Whether you have a family member on a football team, basketball team, gymnastics team, or la crosse team, a yearbook at the end of the season makes a perfect keepsake or coaches’ gift, so try starting yours today.
At Inkubook, we’ve created background schemes to complement many different calendar and life events (such as weddings, babys’ births, and different seasons), and Halloween is no exception. While none of our backgrounds is so terrifying that your hair will turn white with fright, all of them are awfully cute and seasonable.
The Kughens get busy decorating pumpkins.
As you can see, I’ve used the Candy Corn and Happy Jack o’ Lantern backgrounds with photos from this year’s pumpkin decorating. I think they make the perfect backdrop for our pumpkin construction process. Here’s a peek at the full collection of Halloween backgrounds:
One of my favorite things about the Inkubook background collections is that you don’t have to use only the backgrounds that are in the theme you pick when you first start your book. For example, my husband and I will be making a book to give to our mothers for Christmas. It’ll cover the past 12 months, starting with Christmas of last year, so of course we’ll want to use a variety of backgrounds that coordinate with each type of photo we have. Seashells and flip-flops for our trip to Florida, Meow and Woof for our cat and dog, and, of course, the aforementioned backgrounds for Halloween.
If it comes as a surprise to you that you can add more backgrounds to your Backgrounds gallery, here’s a brief tutorial. (This also gives me an opportunity to mention that we gave our editor a little makeover at the end of last week. Things are better organized and easier to find than before, so make sure to check it out.)
The tabs at the top of the updated editor,
with the Backgrounds tab highlighted. Notice
the blue Get More Backgrounds button.
When you’re ready to browse for backgrounds that aren’t in the collection that goes with the theme you chose when you started your book, make sure you’re on the Backgrounds tab (now located at the top of your editor screen) and click the blue Get More Backgrounds button. A screen with the full array of backgrounds will open. You can browse them all and decide which you want to include in your book. Click the one you want then click Apply. The background will be applied to the active page in your book and it’ll be added to your Backgrounds gallery. (Before long it’ll be possible to choose and add several backgrounds at once.)
Use our feedback form or leave a comment on this post to let us know what kind of backgrounds you’d like to see us add, and we’ll send you a t-shirt to thank you for your suggestion.
Holiday season 2008 is in the near distant past, but that doesn’t mean it’s too early to start thinking about what kind of special gift you might make for someone in 2009. In case you haven’t already thought about taking all your old traditional photos and putting them into a photo book, or in case you think it would be too difficult, it might be time for you to think about it a little more. Inkubook member Dick Fey made three books for his children and wrote us to say how pleased he was with them, so we asked Dick if he’d let us tell everyone a little about his experiences with Inkubook.
