DIY [Paris] Scrapbook

Back in December, my sweet husband surprised me with a trip to Paris for my 25th birthday/graduation gift. It was quite the surprise! We had a grand time and I have to say that I left a little piece of my heart there while on the trip. When we got home, clearly I had to find a way to preserve all the memories we made and with being done with school and a stay at home mom, I started exploring my different options for scrapbooking. Honestly, scrapbooking is not my favorite crafty thing to do, so I really had to find some inspiration. I knew I wanted to do something unconventional, unique and different. I wanted this scrapbook to be an adventure of sorts. So, after a long time searching, I figured it out!
For the binding, I went to a local thrift store and picked up an old book with a vintage feel cover. Mine happened to be an old copy of Huckleberry Finn. It was perfect! I cut out the text of the book and the binding and used the front and back covers as the covers for my scrapbook.

Next, I evenly marked where the metal eyelets would be put to hold the guts of my scrapbook in place. This was a tough process. I used an x-acto knife to cut the holes and then hammered in the eyelets with the eyelet kit.
After that, I just began to sort and decorate pieces from our trip! I used receipts, maps, cards, pictures, brochures, etc. that were memories of our time in Paris.

Materials used:
-Vintage book
-metal eyelets
-binder rings
-'hello' name tags
-hole punch
-washi tape
-scrapbooking items (paper pieces, flowers, stickers, things like that)
-and of course, pieces and artifacts from our trip

I really had a blast on this scrapbook! It turned out just the way I wanted it to. It's unique and creative, while sharing the memories we made while in Paris. The vintage book cover gives it that traveling feel, too. As I worked on this project, I realized quickly that there was no way I could mess it up-which is perfect because I am crafty-clumsy sometimes! ;) So my advice would be to just go at it and have fun!

One other thing that I did that gave this scrapbook a little more of heart was I included descriptions of and quotes from the journal I kept while on the trip. For instance, I wrote what I wrote in my journal about seeing the Eiffel Tower for the first time in my scrapbook. That way my words weren't only in my journal!

I hope this inspires you to scrapbook some of your favorite memories or gives you ideas for how to make a unique and fun scrapbook of you own :)

xoxo
sunnee lynn