This very basic scrapbook idea turned into an A-Z adventure, and ultimately, this book. Although the whole scrapbooking industry can assist, determine its role according to your sense of design, creativity, budget, and the amount of time you want to dedicate.
(I admit—mine got a bit out-of-hand.)

Ingredients:

4” 3-ring-binder, ideally with triangle shaped sheet lifter (often included with binder)
½ yd. Fabric of choice
Ribbon
Self-adhesive Felt
Clear page protectors
Metal key tag
Card stock
Other:
Letters, emails, photos, two-dimensional momentos
Your thoughts, hopes, dreams, worries, favorite moments, quotes, and memories
Sharpie™ collection of colored pens

Source: Costco/Sams/BJs for binders and clear page protectors; fabric store for fabric and felt; local hardware store for metal key tag; Staples for ivory card stock paper

How to:

Cover 3” binder with fabric. If you wish, let your child select the pattern. If the binder has a sheet lifter, cover that, too, using a button-hole to make space for the rings to go through. When I sew binder covers, I add a matching ribbon mid-way on each edge. When the binder is complete, tying the ribbon helps keep the binder and its valuable contents safe. It’s more like a journal that way.

Other option: leave binder plain, cover with paper or stickers. Or find an already-decorated binder.

Cut out letter or number in felt. (I used A-Z because sometimes I had more than one binder for a year.) Stick felt letter on binder ½” above the spine’s base.

Remove extra metal ring from metal key tag, and sew tag onto top of binder spine. When this binder is complete, you can write a basic description of its contents (ie: age 2 ½ – 3).

Insert a large chunk of clear sheet protectors in binder and get started!

I use two pieces of card stock back-to-back, to provide more integrity to the page and to keep the permanent pen ink from leaking through to the other side. When I start each book, I write my daughter’s name, the dates covered in the book (amended later), and some decorations. With the same décor theme, I create a page that says “Addendum” for the end, to include relevant items (applications to schools, articles, etc.) And I make a matching final page that reads, “End of Volume #__” for the end of the book. I found that the last page sometimes got caught under the rings, and I did not want something valuable to get stuck.

Write in longhand, or type and print with entertaining fonts. Or create beautiful pages, scan them, and house them online! (I like to see these binders on the living room bookshelf, and I love to see G reach for one and scan through it.)

For a particularly beautiful card containing a special message on the opposite side, measure the size of the message and cut out a window in blank card stock.

Trace and cut out the window on another piece of paper.

Tape the special card down along its edges on the top paper, making certain the message is visible.

Tape the two pieces of cardstock together and display both sides of the gift card while still having the nice thick pages and no ink bleeding. If you have time and really want to dress it up, take double-sided tape and put it on decorative ribbon (or use already taped ribbon). Create a ribbon frame around the message to get rid of the imperfect cutting lines on the two pieces of cardstock. At the end of a volume, write the dates on the metal tag and on the front page of the binder.

Specific ideas:

• Holiday pages: keep everyone’s cards and make a collage of the kids’ photos, so that our binders reflect everyone growing up.
• Grandparent pages: old photos, wedding announcement, yearbook pages
• Dictation pages: the priceless things they say!
• Mom & Dad collage: a collection of photos before becoming parents
• Parents’ growing up pages: photos, notes, memories of childhood
• Sibling pages: designed by older sibs for the new baby
• The Day You Were Born: front page of local and national papers, and other news
• Favorites: foods, colors, games, places
• Milestones: firsts (steps, laugh, words)

These books are works of the heart; each page contains its own story. It’s entirely up to you! After a while, I came up with a model: my words are in traditional upper and lower case, G’s words are in block, making her words pop out. Sometimes I decorate quotes either from G or from great writers and philosophers, and I transcribe my poetry, often giving me a fresh distance on my choice of words.

When we receive something from someone G might not know, I write their identity or relationship to us. I was especially diligent about this in the early years. Now I’m speedier and the details less refined, but she is old enough to access most of her own memories.

Have fun with this and remember that most of the stories we recall are those that are captured in some way, in prose or photography. Don’t let these years sneak away without a touchstone to recapture their magic. The days are many, but the years are few!