Anyways, I recently signed up for ArtsCow.com. They offered free prints, photo books, and other items for free to new members, but you have to pay shipping. Although I was weary of ordering something that had a high chance of being a dud, I only had to pay $16 for two photobooks during a print testing period for the company, so I gave it a chance. It’d have been better for a professional to do it (Heather showed us this awesome photo book at her house a few weeks ago, and it was SWEET, but would have taken all of our purchase budget!) since I am not so good with grouping photos, but it gave me something to do. It took a lot of work, and I did mess up (I’m only human), but the end result will be good enough to send to my mother. The picture quality was okay- I liked the matte finish, but a glossy finish would have been nice to make the colors really pop (and Billy would have liked it more). My favorite part is the back cover. I was happy that my books came out much better than other samples I had seen of previous orders.
Some of My Mistakes
Maybe I’ll buy more in the future, but for now, no. I have one copy to keep with my Shutterfly photo book that I made for our engagement photos/guest book (which was a hit at the wedding!). I like that these new books don’t have page numbers like the Shutterfly book, and the quality is similar in both. ArtsCow was cheaper, though! I haven’t tried their other products yet (I have no money!), but I can’t wait to try out their prints. I need to make brag books with removable photos for my grandmother so she can make copies. The only pictures she’ll be getting are of her grandchildren, lol.
Random note: I know I’m going to change in the future, but for now, “digi scappers” scare the world out of me. Regular scrapbooking is something I have tried in the past, but after the lackluster response from Billy and the immense expense in making one, I gave that up. The new kind of scrapbooking people are doing these days with their digital pictures and layouts are crazy (some of them are pretty good, too). Just wait until ten years from now when I have children. I’ll definitely be doing that in the future (but in a much cooler way).
