So, I’d like to talk about albums. But first a little story. Earlier this year I decided to go with KISS Wedding Books as my album vendor. I think they are fabulous for a multitude of reasons and I’ve shown you a couple of them in the past (here and here). Well, this week I went to an SEO Workshop (PS. you won’t see me in the video of testimonials from the day because I got horrible video fright, still pictures are just fine, video is terrifying) with about 30 of my industry peers, and the last person to enter the room was one of the owners of KISS, Shaun Austin. I didn’t know who he was, but once he identified that he was the owner of this fabulous company I couldn’t help but yell “I love you!” like some kind of groupie!

Ok. Weddings. Photography. Albums. All topics of discussion. This last weekend I got my latest package from KISS (perfect timing by the way, it came just before a meeting with a prospective client and I think she liked it ) and I decided the next topic of Education Nation will be albums. I was originally thinking I would end this series with albums because the album is the final phase of the wedding photography experience but because it’s my series and I can do whatever I want, I’m skipping ahead a little.

When you are planning a wedding, it’s overwhelming to say the least. There are so many decisions to make and details to oversee. Once you’ve decided who your wedding photographer is going to be, you typically then have to decide which of their “packages” is right for you. For the most part you are deciding how many hours of coverage you need, how many photographers you need, and then which finished products you want after all is said and done. The way I structure my photography collections you can say “hey I’m completely overwhelmed right now, can you just show up and shoot and we’ll make the decision about what we want later?” and that’s totally fine. Or you can choose a package that has an album built into it.

The wedding photography album is the ultimate final product from your wedding. Within your wedding album contains the dress, the shoes, the I do’s, the kiss, the intimate moments, the fun, the cake, the food, the bouquet toss, the love. In one neat little package you have all the memories from your day in an album that will last your lifetime and can be passed down through generations. This one place is the only place where your wedding lasts once the day is over and everyone has gone home. I think it’s obvious how important I think the album is to telling and re-living the story of your special day. Having the wedding album to store these moments for you is much more presentable (and impressive!) than keeping them on the CD of images that get hardly any play. So when planning your wedding think about the photography and think about what you will do with the photographs once the day is over.

This sample album is 12×12 inches square in lime green! You can also get 8×8 or 10×10. And now introducing 4×4 “brag books.” These little 4×4 albums are an exact duplicate of your larger album but small enough to keep in your purse or pocket. And they are seriously so incredible! You can get your albums in several different colors I just like green.

Please enjoy Aundrea and Doug’s (engagement, wedding, day after) wedding album. You can see the full album design slideshow here: THE ALBUM.

How cute are those little albums?!

Here’s the full ALBUM again in case you missed it.

*Contact me* *View my portfolio*

Then a couple weeks later Danni announced our partners and she did such a fabulous job! My partner, Tawny, is absolutely adorable, also a photographer, also a non-meat eater, and she lives in So Cal too! We started chatting over email and decided that we should definitely meet up some time for lunch…I’m so excited about that! And what I loved most about her was she wanted to extend the deadline…I HAD MORE TIME! YES! And then after she extended the deadline, I asked if I could extend it. But here we are now, our packages have been sent and received and I’m so delighted.

After I packaged up my lovelies, it was dark so I couldn’t take a picture of the outside, so I told myself DO NOT forget to take a picture before going to the Post Office. So obviously I forgot and had to take the outside picture with my iPhone on the hood of my car in the parking lot of the USPS.

Here are my packages.

Back in the day I used to make these journals for all my friends. (Please excuse the horrible photography, these pictures are from a couple of years ago!)

And I thought I would do that. But then I started noticing on Etsy all these journals that are more of a hodge-podge of papers and little snippets and odds and ends and I thought they were so cute and creative. So I decided to try making one of them instead. I think it turned out super cute. I started with the Levenger binding system. If you don’t know about Levenger just go buy one, you’ll love it! The Levenger system is awesome because you can take items out, add items, and move items around with the ease of a three-ring binder, but this looks cooler/nicer. So theoretically if the recipient were to have the Levenger hole-puncher she could add to this journal to her hearts content.

I used a lot of different papers and dividers in this journal but I didn’t really add a lot of words or writing because I wanted her to be able to completely customize it. She can doodle or add stickers or whatever.

Here’s a few pictures.

So since the whole point of this exchange was packaging, I was able to use this journal as a package for some of the other things I got her! Which I thought was clever. Tawny told me that she loves letterpress, which is convenient because I love letterpress and many of my favorite Etsy shops are letterpressers. I was introduced to SimpleSong’s shop by Jill Thomas from the Jasmine Star Workshop earlier this year. I’ve been lusting over some of her designs and thought this was the perfect occasion to make a purchase. How cute are these cards! It combines her love for photography, letterpress, and postcards all into one! The adorable print is from RosieMusic.

She also told me she loves Polaroids so I found this super cute Polaroid photo album from Lindseydee. I was going to decorate the front of the album with the camera sticker (above) from Red Velvet Art but I figured I would let her decide if she wanted the sticker to go on that album or on something else. And she loves succulents and sent me a link to one of her favorite succulent sellers, Pigeon Toe Ceramics. I got the thimble cup hair thingy and I think I now love succulents too, it’s so cute! And apparently pretty hard to kill. I also picked up these thought bubble post it notes, super cute!

There are a few more treasures hidden in some of the pages of the journal.

And now to the package I received from Tawny! Ok, I know it wasn’t a contest, but if it had been she would have TOTALLY won!

I LOVE everything she got me. The little bowl is so cute and the hairpins-I’ll be wearing them tomorrow!

So you may have noticed up in the journal that I included a couple bags of my favorite tea, and she gave me a box of my favorite tea which is so incredibly perfect because I ran out today and haven’t had a chance to go to Trader Joe’s!!

Tawny – It was so much fun and such a pleasure to be your partner for this lovely, fun package exchange. I cannot wait to meet you in real life!!!

Thank you for visiting,
amanda

*Contact me* *View my portfolio*