Great Gift Ideas: 2010 Calendars

I love to give calendars as gifts.  Especially, to those who don’t papercraft. A mini book or album may be pulled off the book shelf and looked at now and again, but a calendar is a gift the receiver will look at every day.

Think Outside The Box Challenge:  When creating a calendar as a gift, create one the recipient will enjoy looking at every day. 

"3x6 12 Page Mini Album Calendar" by Rebecca Grinder

Supplies: Me & My Big Ideas mini book kit, silk flowers, vintage leaves, K&Co Brad, bee pin, Ranger Dye Ink, Crop-a-dile, large binder ring, screw in hook, Martha Stewart butterfly punch.

I created this kit for others to purchase at my etsy shop at One Bright Spot. 

The perfect gift has the perfect price -

The Me and My Big Ideas 6x6 Mini Album kits are perfect for this type of project.  I cut the patterned paper and chipboard in half, creating 2 mini books for the price of one.  These kits also come with matching embellishments.  I did have to pull out an additional peice of patterned paper to have enough pages for the covers. 

I print wallet size pictures (4 per sheet for 39 cents) at Costco for this 3x6 size calendar.  It works well if I am making duplicate gifts. 

I printed the actual 2010 calendar months off onto cardstock from a free Microsoft Office Online template download. 

Variation - Instead of only 12 pages, create 31 pages. Each page numbered for the day of the month. Although this calendar is much more teatious of a project, the calendar is reusable year after year. Use photo corners for the pictures so when they become outdated, they can be easily replaced.

Tips and Tricks - 

In order to hold the silk flower:

1.  I punched a hole in the front cover chipboard.

2.  Then, I trimmed the silk flower stem, keeping between 1/2-3/4 inch of stem to feed into the front cover.

3.  Next, I took the layers of the flower apart, using half or more for the outside front cover.  After feeding the stem through the hole, I placed the remaining petals on the stem inside the front cover.

4.  Then, using a long tailed brad, I stuck the brad into the stem to hold the flower in place (along with some adhesive on the petals should do the trick!).

Here is a super easy and quick trick...try nesting a brad into a button by punching a larger hole into your button using the Crop-a-dile tool.  I love this technique when it works!  Not all plastic buttons survive through the pressure of the Crop-a-dile.  Yet, when it works, the effect is a fun way to use your decorative brads and buttons that are laying around. 

Here are some more Calendar ideas to inspire you...

"Love Calendar" by Caryl Hope

The back...see the entire project here!

Here are some other calendar ideas you should check out…

Scrapbook Crazy has some fantastic calendar tutorials.

Go digital! Designer Michelle Filo from With Love By Mushy has an amazing Digital Desk Top Calendar kit. Check out her beyond amazing project here!

Check your local papercrafting store for upcoming calendar classes or purchase the newest Basic Grey calendar kit which retails for about $20!