My Birthday Present to Caitlin, Made with Love

My friend Meng Lee inspired me with her beautiful scrapbook albums. So I decided in January that I would do one for Caitlin's first birthday. The course I wanted - how to do a photo album that had a lovely wooden cover and that fit a cigar box - was full and I had to wait till April for the next course. So - I decided to go it myself. It took me about 40 hours to complete this photo album, more money than expected, backaches by the dozen, but the end product is something so beautifully detailed, that I am so proud of myself. I did not realise that I was creative at all and that I had the patience to plan the layouts, cut all the sheets of paper, print the photos, trim them, mount them, and put in every small embellishment, run to the shops every now and then to get more stuff. I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it; mostly I found it very therapeutic, though having to do it in secrecy meant I had to lock myself in the room away from Atun and hide every damn thing once I was done and whenever the girls came over, but it provided that much more excitement to the project. Adrian is so proud of me as well. His help was obtained in adding more pages to the album (it involved a screwdriver), and taking all these photographs in our makeshift studio ! I used his beautiful photograph for the 12th month birthday page. Enjoy this album, Caitlin, made with love, by your Gammy.