A simple album formula ...

... I created two of these albums in less than 2 hours, so, since we are all strapped for time and unique gift ideas, I thought I'd share this with you. All I used were:

Two 6 x 6 chipboard sheets
Three 6 x 6 acrylic panels
One sheet of 12 x 12 Class of 2009 paper
One 12x12 sheet black cardstock
One 12x12 sheet silver cardstock
Two 12x12 sheets of different graduation papers
Silver acrylic paint dabber
Ribbon
Strong corner rounder
Binding method

The trick to keeping this fast and easy is to keep the page and mat sizes modular. I cut the papers up as follows:

One sheet of 12 x 12 Class of 2009 paper - I just cut the top strip of the paper with the writing, the rest was white and I saved it for journaling once I have photos.
One 12x12 sheet black cardstock - cut into four 5.25 x 5.25 pieces
One 12x12 sheet silver cardstock - cut into four 6 x 6 pieces
Two 12x12 sheets of different graduation papers - Cut them each in to four 5 x 5 squares

Save your scraps, as we will be using some of them in a minute.

So, here is what I did:
1) Take four of the 5 x 5 graduation paper squares (your choice) and mat them on the black cardstock. All of the black cardstock should be used up.
2) Take the four silver cardstock 6 x 6 squares and adhere them to the front and back of the 6 x 6 chipboard panels. Trim/sand as necessary so the paper is flush with the edge. Be sure to adhere the edges of the cardstock very well so they won;t peel over time.
3) Place your chipboard and acrylic panels (they should still have the blue film on them) in the following order: Acrylic on the front, chipboard, acrylic, chipboard and then acrylic on the back. Use the corner rounder to corner round the right two corners (the non-binding side) only, of all of the chipboard and acrylic.


4)Peel the blue film off of all of the acrylic panels. Take the Class of 2009 strip and lay it across the front of the acrylic cover panel so the words are centered on the front of the cover. Adhere it down, wrapping the ends around to the back side of the cover. The ends will not quite meet, so you can add a matted word (as I did in the sample) or other embellishment to hide it.


5) Add the remaining graduation paper and matted squares to the pages as you wish. Some things to keep in mind: Make sure that when you place squares on an acrylic page, it is simplest to use the same size square on the opposite side so they hide each others' adhesive. Also, before adhering the squares to the pages, you can also tie ribbon around the squares as an accent.
6) I also took scraps of the black cardstock and made a couple of edge borders to change up the simple page designs.
7) Bind the album together with the Bind-it-All and o-wire (I used 1-inch o-wire)or a Crop-a-dile and o- or book-rings. For binding tips you can go to the Kits2Remember Tips and Tricks page.
8) Add ribbon to the bindings.

There are plenty of variations you can add to the album, such as stamping, painting, Stickles, embellishments, etc., but you can see how this basic "recipe" makes it easy to switch out papers and themes for a simple yet attractive gift album that can be completed within an hour. Have fun!