Tuesday, September 20, 2011

Pre-Toddler Activity #8: Make Your Own Personalized Board Book

Do YOU live miles away from your extended family?  Does your child(ren) rarely get to experience life with their cousins?  Does your child(ren) enjoy board books?

In our situation, we live a short drive from my husband's family, but my family lives several hundred miles away.  Unfortunately, they are not big on skype... or technology for that matter.  However, I want my son to recognize my family, so I decided to make a FAMILY BOARD BOOK.


What you need:
Print photos of extended family members to be cut out and taped to the board book pages.


Organize and tape photos to pages.  For example, the book I made includes 2 pages of my sister, brother-in-law, and nephew; 2 pages of my parents; 2 pages of my brother-in-law's family; 2 pages of my mother and father-in-law; and 2 pages with the letters of the alphabet and corresponding names of family members with various photos.


Print family member names beside corresponding photos.

Measure contact paper leaving approximately 1/2 inch extra paper to be used to fold over edges of each board book page.


I measured across two pages, then cut the contact paper in half before applying.




Apply contact paper to each individual page folding edges over onto previous page, and smoothing out air bubbles.






As you read the book, encourage your child(ren) to point to the family member as you name them, spell out their names, tell them the letter their name starts with, teach them about cousins/aunts/uncles/grandparents/etc.








Tip #5:  Go through the drawers and cabinets in your house, I guarantee you will find something new for your child to explore.


View other 12-18 Month Activities:

**I am linking up with I Can Teach My Child, 30 Days, Idea Room, and No Time For Flashcards.

13 comments:

Courtney said...

Such a fun idea! I love how indestructible it is!! Thanks for this!!

Anna Boney said...

Love this! B's got a photo book with all of his family in it too- it is his daily request to read! He loves to name his grandparents! We pray for our family members each night and I feel like he knows who we are talking about since he sees them in pictures each day!

Again, you are so talented friend!

Carrie said...

Great idea, Amber!!

Carrie said...

p.s. I pinned this on Pinterest ;)

Ashley Sisk said...

Awww that's a really cute idea.

Anonymous said...

How fun. What a great idea.

Katie Perdue said...

love this idea! i am a big fan of shutterfly photobooks, and was always amazed at how my neice could pick out each person and place. It can really help them develop vocabulary- which is great. :)

Anonymous said...

I'm really impressed by this. Great idea, Amber!

Amanda said...

Cute! Didn't know you could buy plain board books like that. Maybe I need to make a potty time book for E! I found a My First Family Photo Album book which was really cute and had a "flash" button you could click that lights up. It was adorable, but a little limiting--we have a lot of family and needed more places for photos!

deb duty said...

This is so neat! The photos of him looking at his new book are so sweet!

Unknown said...

This is awesome :) I put together a little photo album for my niece, and she looks at it all.the.time!!

Marissa said...

This is a really cute idea. I've made photo books through Kodak or Shutterfly before but I like this even better because it's kid-friendly, and what kid doesn't love to look at pictures of himself!

Vicky @ Mess For Less said...

That is adorable! What a great idea. And I just love contact paper and you have come up with another use for it. You have a great site here and I love your activities. I am a new follower from Link and Learn. Vicky @ www.messforless.net