Shopping for my parents was a lot harder before I had kids. They’re the type of people who tend to purchase themselves whatever material items they desire and it left me scratching my head most years. Now that we have children, gift giving is easier because they adore almost anything featuring my kids. I’ve purchased them everything from custom photo cases to hand print stepping stones and even magnetic photo puzzles for the refrigerator.
This year I finally got around to make them a custom photo book. Designing a photo book has always seemed like a daunting task to me. I tend to take thousands of photos throughout the year and the idea of trying to turn them into a book was overwhelming. I started the year with an effort to organize and edit my photos as I took them – instead of leaving them spread across a million files and SD cards. It made it even easier to design the photo book thanks to Walmart. I was able to upload photos from my computer, grab them from Facebook, Flickr and even DropBox.
Plus there were so many templates to choose from and designing the book was actually as simple as dragging and dropping photos until I was satisfied with the arrangement. While I was designing the book I tried to think of ways to make it even more personalized. Ultimately I decided to leave a few pages blank. The beginning of the photo book features a current portrait of each of my kids and we used the accompanying blank page to showcase their hand prints. Then throughout the album we chose to leave a few more blank pages for custom artwork by the kids. I feel like these personal touches, more than anything else, are what made this gift truly unique.
The whole album was done in less than 30 minutes and our local Walmart offers Free Same Day pick-up in store! Since I’m there just about everyday anyway, this feature was so convenient and I grabbed my photo book while picking up items for dinner. Awesome real life multi-tasking right here :)
Walmart Photo Center even offers 1 hour pickup for extreme procrastinators. I imagine this will be even more convenient as the holidays draw near and we scramble for those final last minute gifts that always seem to magically appear on our list. Personally, I can see myself taking advantage of there 1 Hour Holiday Cards for our Holiday photos this year and I know a few people who would enjoy personalized calendars, mounted prints and Canvases – all available Same Day or in an hour!
What are your favorite photo gifts to give and receive? How else would you personalize a photo book even further?
Sponsored post by Mirum. All opinions are my own.
Photo albums and photo books are always my favorite gifts; collage frames too
I love this idea! This is perfect for gifting for the holiday’s. We just had a baby, so I know the grandmother’s would love this gift!