Photo Mini Diary Tutorial

Today has nothing to do with cakes, but it is SWEET! And since this is EVERYTHING sweet, it goes.

Today is a little tutorial on how to do these great little photo diaries (I guess that's what you'd call them). I have been doing these for a couple of years now with my little girls and I always get questions from friends on how to do them so I decided to create a little tutorial for anyone who is interested in creating their own. :)

Basically, I take one of my favorite pics of my baby and around her birthday I add a few words to the photo to describe HER...what a couple of her favorite things are, funny things she said, quirky habits, inside jokes, etc.

I created mine in Paint! Its no special app, its free, came with my computer....First step, open your photo...(correction...first step is TAKE a great photo, then turn it into a black and white photo), THEN open the photo in Paint. ;)

When you first open it (if it is a large photo) it will look like that (down below). OOPS! Too big. ;) Zoom out so you can see what you're working with...hit the view button (see arrow) then zoom out.

Zooming out, zooming out, zooming out, until....

Now you can see what you're working with!! ;) Now to start adding your words!

Hit the Home button, then the button with the letter "A", which is the text box button.

Once you've selected the text box option, click on the picture and drag the mouse to create a box as big as you'd like. This was a large photo so for the name and age I chose 300 font size. Make sure to avoid writing ON the subject you're writing about (wouldn't want to cover up that pretty little face) ;) Oh, and choose black or white color font depending on the background. Your background might be lighter in which case you'd want to do a black font, or it could be dark like my photo so choose white font.



Next step is adding the fun descriptions...same formula, select the "A" button and start a new text box, placing it wherever you want on the photo. You'll need to go with a much smaller font size than the title, making sure to change the size of each description to give it a little character. (my font sizes ranged from 120 to 35). The good thing about this project (and what makes it so easy) is that its not supposed to be perfectly lined up, proportioned, etc. The words are all over the place (at least that's how I did it).

Add and add and add all your text until you're done. VOILA!! You have a sweet little photo mini diary of your child's quirky habits, favorite things, funny sayings, etc. :)

Oh, and I have another one...a little different from my sweet Bailey girl. Its Olivia, my other baby...the mischievous one. I love her. Love her, love her, but she is crazy.. Here she is...read up, you'll get a little sense of who Liv is. ;)

Hopefully this helps some of y'all out there to do your own little photo diary.

Have fun!!!! Say cheese. Oh, and eat Cake too!!!!!