20 Questions – Favorite Things Book

20 Questions

I found this simple little book today. I so love this idea. It is so simple but gives such an interesting snap shot of growing up. It is just a list of questions about a child’s favorite things to be answered each year from age three to eighteen. Here is how the author, Nicole Reaves, describes her book.

Capture memories from your little ones childhood with this birthday interview book. Here is how it works :

Every year, on or around your child’s birthday, you ask the same 20 questions listed within the pages of the book and fill in their answers. Questions like : What is your favorite color? What is your favorite song? Then, add a photo of the child on the opposite page. Easy, right? Repeat next year and for the next 14 years. 16 years in all.

Think of how fun it will be to look through this memory book in your child’s teenage and young adult years! See how much they changed from year to year. When it’s full, keep it for yourself, or give it to the interviewee.

This book was designed to be a fun way to record and remember simple memories from the childhood of your kids, grand kids, nieces, nephews, godchildren, or any little one in your life.

20 Questions (Pink)

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Blurb Savings

I got a new blurb discount today. This is as good as it gets, 25% off with no minimum! It is a great time to take care of any books you want to put together for Christmas gifts. One idea if you don’t have another project in the works is to do planners. Blurb has customizable planners. I did one for a friend last year and it turned out really nice. I am going to look at my projects and see how I can take advantage of this discount. It would be perfect for the new addition of the Waffle Book. The offer is good until November 20th. Use the code IMAGINATION at check out.*

*Offer valid through November 20, 2012 (11:59 p.m. local time). Valid for printed books only. A 25% discount is applied to your product total. Maximum discount is USD $150, GBP £95, EUR €115, CAD $150, or AUD $150 off product total. This offer is good for one-time use, and cannot be combined with volume discounts, other promotional codes, gift cards, or used for adjustments on previous orders.

 

Digitizing Old Documents and Books

Pbok1-1696

Pbok1-1696 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

FamilySearch has a great post on Digitizing Techniques for Old Documents and Books by James Tanner. All summarize it here but follow the link above to get all the details.

The first thing to keep in mind about old books and documents is the difference between old and valuable. The key is not to confuse old with rare or limited edition books. This will affect how you go about digitizing it. If the value of a book is the information it has then the best way to scan it is to take it apart so the pages can lay flat. But if the book has value it might be best to get professional help to digitize its pages without damaging it. James Tanner has the following links to sites that discuss how to build you own book scanner.

The trick is to keep the pages flat and the camera at 90 degrees to the page. You will always get the best quality image by making sure the pages is at a 90 degree angle to the imaging device. Flat bed scanners are designed for this. If you use a digital camera it is much more difficult to get a good quality image. Thanks James for the great article. I’m filing it away for future reference.

I’ve learned some of this by trial and error but I’ve never thought through the intrinsic vs. extrinsic value before. The best tip I have is when the print is showing through from the other side of the page place a sheet of black paper behind it before scanning. What tips and tricks do you have when digitizing books and documents?

Read the full article here.

Blurb – my favorite for self publishing

I’m a huge fan of Blurb.com! I have published more than a dozen books with them and I will continue to use them in the future. Blurb has 7 different sizes of books. My favorite is the 7×7. It makes such a nice compact book for those not huge projects. I also prefer the ImageWrap for the binding. It gives you a very durable cover plus the ability to have any kind of image or design on the cover you would like. If you haven’t used them before I highly recommend them. I’m grateful to a neighbor who told me about them a few years ago.

Remember Me

Last week I happened across “Remember Me” by Lesley Graham on Blurb. She uses a very collage style to illustrate the book that is very effective in telling this story. The book is about her grandfather who is losing his memory and his journey. I’m inspired by her work and will keep it in mind for future projects. Blurb has a cool preview feature that lets you see the entire book or just a few pages depending on how you set it up.

You can save 20% on two books with the promo code MOMRULES until May 2, 2012*.

*Offer valid through May 2, 2012 (11:59 p.m. local time). A 20% discount is applied toward your product total with a minimum order of 2 units or more. Maximum discount is USD $150, GBP £75, EUR €100, CAD $150, or AUD $150 off product total. Valid for printed books only. This offer is good for one-time use, and cannot be combined with volume discounts, other promotional codes, gift cards, or used for adjustments on previous orders.