some details about blurb

I've had several questions about my book and I realized I didn't even specify what Blurb is.

I get my book done through blurb.com.  There is a free software called Booksmart that you download from their website.  When you first begin, you can choose whatever kind of book you are wanting to design.  There are lots of options, including just a picture book. 

By choosing "blog to book", it will connect to blogger (or a few other blogging sites if you use something different) and it will "slurp" (just the strange word they use) your blog posts and pictures into the software. 

You can choose to have it fill your pages automatically, or you can choose to place your own posts and pictures in each page and change the layouts.  If you have it fill your pages automatically, I think it pretty much uses one layout for the whole book.  Quite boring, and you don't get any of the pages with bigger pictures on them. 

I actually go ahead and have it place them on pages for me, but then I start at the beginning and change my layouts for each page.  I just look at the pictures I have for each post, decide if I want any of them big, or if they'll all fit into one page layout, etc.  The software isn't hard but there are a few things about it that cause it to be time consuming. 

I've also found that when it "slurps" your photos from blogger, they are a very low resolution picture.  But if you pull the pictures from your computer straight into the software, they are better quality for those larger photo pages, especially the full page pictures. So although my pictures are automatically uploaded into the software when I "slurp" it, I still have to go find them again and replace them with the original version. This really adds extra time. Have any of you other blurb users found this to be true? 

Now, if you really wanted to make a fast book and didn't really care about the layouts - you just wanted your posts and pictures on your pages - then you could probably just be fine with the automatic layouts that the software does for you.  And you could possibly spend way less time than I do. 

The pricing is awesome.  I paid $75ish for almost 150 pages I think.  It will do books with pages up to 400 or something around that.  I loved an idea I read about over at Under the Sycamore, where Ashley purchases 2 books each time she makes one.  One for that little hands to be all over and enjoy paging through, reliving memories, so you don't have to freak out about pages ripping or dirty hands making smudge marks. And then one to have on a shelf or storage somewhere and be kept nice for years to come.

If only I was good at staying on top of things and slurping one month at a time into my software and working gradually on it.  That would be ideal.  But really, I'm kind of okay with being 3 years behind.  If I was trying to scrapbook our family memories, I can't imagine where I'd be.  I love that my blog gives me a purpose for my pictures and stories and to record all the things I want to remember....and then they can be saved forever in a book that will hopefully become treasures to all of us down the road.  If it wasn't for my blog and these books - I'll I would have is folders and folders full of digital pictures and nothing being done with them.

Someday I may catch up to the current year, but even being behind still gives me a sense of accomplishment each time I finish one.  And already I see how much my kids love these books - it makes the time and money completely worth it.