This layout is the latest addition to my ongoing nieces & nephews baby album. (Size: 8 x 8.) I take a picture of me with every new bundle of joy that joins the extended Jeff & Janet Hill family, and I add it to this highly templated album. The product line is an older Heidi Grace line that I fell in love with in 2007, I believe.
This may seem like a LOT of nieces and nephews, but that tends to happen when you have five siblings. My older brother, Matt, has four children; my younger brother Jon has two children; and my younger sister Michele has three children. I also have a brother and a sister who are in their early-to-mid 20s and are not married yet!
The title page says "Baby & Me: All the babies I've loved before," and it starts by showing pictures of me with each of my five siblings as babies. Half the fun of this album (besides seeing all the cute babies) is watching ME grow up through the pictures.
First, there was Haylee. I couldn't believe how much more love I felt for my first little niece than I had ever felt for another child before her. I was instantly hooked on this whole aunt thing. And the feeling came back with every new arrival, starting with Haylee's little sister, Breanna.
Jensyn and Thomas arrived just three months apart. (Of course, they were supposed to be six months apart, but Thomas joined the world really, really early.) My background pages are red for girls and blue for boys, and there's a little journaling card tucked behind each monogram that shares my experiences getting to know each of them.
And now for a couple of boys in a row! The sheet of monogram die-cuts I used for this album includes only one of each letter, so I had to trace the "b" from Breanna's page to make a new "b" for Brock's page. I've instructed my family members not to repeat any more first initials in the future. (ha!)
Derek and Gillian are just four months apart, which is only possible because they're cousins rather than siblings. Derek is my older brother Matt's fourth and last child, while Gillian is my little sister's second child.
And this is the newest nephew to join the crew, baby Townes. Again, I had to trace a "t" from Thomas's page to make my own monogram. (Thank goodness I used removable adhesive!) Townes is the little brother of Gillian and Thomas, and he's definitely a keeper.
To make the ongoing-ness of this album super easy, I gathered all my extra supplies and slipped them into the remaining page protectors in this album. I cut lots of extra journaling cards and journaling pockets up front, so I wouldn't have to go back and remember sizes or dimensions on future pages. (Or if you don't like the hassle of coordinating supplies, you could always wait until everyone's done having babies and create digital photo books that you could print multiple copies of for each of your siblings!)
I have enough supplies and enough room in the album for 10 more babies. At this point, it's hard to imagine that there could be 10 more, but if just ONE of us follows in my parents' footsteps and produces a half-dozen offspring, it's entirely possible.
The End.
