No, this isn't THE Book. It's just a Blurb blog book for my babes (say that ten times). Blurb - an online book making company - has a feature that can turn a blog into a book. Every once in a while it's occured to me that I've done nothing to back up this blog, and that if anything were to happen over at dear Typepad, all of the archives could be lost in a puff of smoke (I suppose there wouldn't be any smoke). Which isn't a terribly big deal (frankly, some of those early posts make me cringe when I stumble upon them now), but I think the babes might someday like to have a peek at what this whole blog thing was about. Or at the very least, they'll want to know exactly what I told the whole wide world about them. And honestly? My baby book record keeping is subpar at best. I can take all the extra supplementing I can get.
The short of it is that Blurb works by downloading your blog into their software, where you can then format and edit the book, and then upload it back to them for printing. There are many options along the way that will affect pricing, layout, content, binding, etc. I found it to be a rather smooth process, easy to follow, and such. Since I wanted one blog post (and it's photos) per page, I just printed Year One this time. Still - that was four hundred and something pages long, making for some tedious formatting, and a rather hefty price at the end (this is all the fault of the quantity of my content, not Blurb). I'm really impressed with the quality of the book itself - it's quite well made. Soon, I'll make my way through year two and print that one, which I fear is going to be bigger. Apparently I got wordy in year two. Me, wordy? I had no idea.
Added later: Well, I should have known you'd all be so interested in this! Isn't it such a great idea? You can find more information on their pricing here. Mine is gigantic, so it fit into the top price category ($80). I said the price was 'hefty', but really, I'm pleased with what I got for the price. As for the process, I don't really have any tips to share - it went smoothly for me. I had 400 posts I put in this book, and nearly 700 photos, so downlaoding/uploading took a long, long time, even with my broadband connection. It does only work with blog programs (Typepad and such), and yes there is an option to print blog comments. And no - I'm not advertising for Blurb, but hey! I'll gladly take a discount on my next order! (wink, wink.)
