I love photos. Just ask my kids. I photograph just about everything I can from big trips, to small moments playing a board game on a rainy day. I don't want to forget a thing, and I don't want my kids to forget either.
When I was a kid cameras were such a hassle. You'd pick up a disposable camera from Rite Aid, snap about 27 pictures and then send it off to be developed....and hope you caught something good on there. The photos would be put in albums, stuffed into photo boxes and pushed into closets or under the bed to be forgotten.
At age 18 I came across a Scrapbook store in town and immediately fell in love. I loved all the embellishments, themed paper, and stickers of every kind. I'd spend an hour creating a page that highlighted maybe 2-3 photos. It was an art form that relaxed me. When I had my first son I continued scrapbooking. When he went to sleep I would cut and craft the night away to relax me and ended up making three complete scrapbooks for him. Then baby #2 came and oh how my world changed.
Scrapbooking became a hobby I could no longer afford in both time and money so I moved onto creating photo books through online companies like Shutterfly and Snapfish. But even those were extremely time consuming- Picking templates, arranging photos, writing captions, color coordinating borders.
But you guys, I found something really good...like REALLY REALLY good and it takes me absolutely no time at all. Too good to be true? I think not!
Let me introduce you to Chatbooks. My saving grace of photo books. This is going to sound simple....and that's because it is. Download the app to your phone. Connect your Instagram or Facebook. And.....you're done! No really, that's it!
My Chatbooks app is connected to my Instagram so that every photo I post goes directly into my photo book. The picture will have the date, the location I tagged the photo at, and the caption I wrote. Each book allows for 60 photos and I signed up for a subscription, so every time 60 photos are filled into the book I get an email, check the app, remove any photos I don't want in the book, and it autoships to my house. Every 60 photos we get a surprise book in the mail that the kids love opening. They love looking back at their adventures, reliving the moments, and keeping the memories alive inside them.
Each photo book is 6"x6" and is $10 for soft cover and $15 for hard cover. We opted for the soft cover because we get books sometimes twice a month with the amount of photos I take, and I try to make it cost effective for us. Oh and did I mention that the spine of the book tells you what volume number the book is and what dates the book covers. Ex. Vol. 11: 19 Jan - 29 March 2015. We're actually on volume 51 right now so you can see that I really really love and believe in this company.
In the app you can delete photos you don't want in the book, so every week I will go in and remove photos that I take at work, or wine nights out with my friends so that the books are just about the kids. (I do have a second subscription of photo books with my photos so that my kids will one day see I had somewhat of a life too). I can also see which books are be printed, which one is in a draft, and which ones have been delivered.
When the kids see the aqua envelope in the mailbox they get so excited. They stop everything they are doing and will sit through and look at the photos page by page, reading the caption and seeing those moments as I saw them through my eyes. Seeing the photos sparks little memories and funny moments from that day that we share together and laugh over.
I highly recommend checking chatbooks out and if you go to this link you'll get $10 in credit. Offer expires August 6, 2018. http://invite.chatbooks.com/ashleyerikson5at
