There is a reason...

You just never know when good things will happen to you. Last Saturday, I participated in the I Heart Utah Festival. They were expecting 10,000 people and got about 125. Yep. 125 people! It was sooooo hot and depressing. All the vendors were annoyed. At around 5:00 pm I decided that I'd call it a day. I just didn't want to stay another 2 hours. Then, Rannette - the Cherish Bound consultant who was sharing my booth - said we had toughed it out all day long, we should stay until the end. So we did. And the most amazing things happened...
1. I met a lady who had a booth next to mine. She thought our business sounded interesting and I'm going to go and do a gathering at her house for her and 5 daughters!
2. One of her daughters was there with her and just happened to be a teacher. I told her about the I'm An Author program for schools, and she is super excited about it. She is going to talk to her principal about having me come and teach it.
3. 2 other people came to talk to me about I'm An Author. One lady wants me to do it in the private school her kids go to. The other guy is going to convince his mother (who is a teacher) that she can't live without it!
4. I met another vendor who was promoting a concert. She offered us a booth (one of only 6) at a very reduced price, gave us 50 tickets to sell for full profit, and when she found out about my cancer, she gave me another 50 tickets to sell at the cancer walk - we get to keep all the proceeds. Incredible.
5. And last, but not least, I met a family who travels to Guatemala every 8 weeks. I told them about Four of Hearts Foundation and they are so excited to help us do fundraising and help us when we go down to Guatemala.

You just never know when cool things are going to happen. I feel like there was a reason I signed up for this festival, a reason I got a partner to help with the booth, a reason we stayed late, and a reason we met all of these people. I love it when cool things happen!

My New Business

Well friends and family,

I've done it! I've decided to move from the corporate offices of Cherish Bound to my own office at my house. Yep, that's right - I'm now, officially, a Cherish Bound consultant. I'm really excited for this opportunity to build a flexible business. I love Cherish Bound and wanted to stay with them, but with my health being unpredictable right now, I probably can't have a "go to the office" job. I need more flexibility, and so having my own business seems the right way to go. I've started a business blog and would love to have you go and look at it.

www.boundtobecherished.blogspot.com

It's under construction right now, but each day I'm adding more to it. Sign up to follow it, because as soon as I get squared away and know what I'm doing, I'll be giving away CB product there. There also a great opportunity for bloggers from Utah to join me at a free night of story-telling at the Orem library on June 25th. I can't wait to go to this. Go to my CB blog to find instructions on signing up - it's first come, first serve. Look for today's blog post. (The really cool thing is that you'll get $200 of free stuff for going! Sweet!!)

Cherish Bound is such a great business to be in - the product is incredible, and the business opportunity is outstanding. Check out Cherish Bound right now.

www.cherishbound.com

If you like what you see and would love the flexibility of owning your own business, let me know. I'd love to have you on my Utah team. If you live outside of Utah, that's no problem - you'd be a great asset to my team, too. If you don't want to be a consultant, but want to preserve your memories in an easy, beautiful way - let me know. I'd love to sign you up as a customer and help you get started. Oh, and one last thing - this Labor Day weekend, Cherish Bound is holding their annual convention at the Timpanogos Story Telling Festival. Sign up as a consultant and go with me to the convention - you won't be sorry. It's a blast!!

Wish me luck!

Graduation Memories

For those of you who have kids graduating - from high school or college - now is the time to get started on their graduation book. You won't want to miss any of those great memories they are making right now, during the last few months of school. Prom, Senior Night, Concerts, Graduation, Senior Trips, etc. There are so many moments to record.

I didn't know about Cherish Bound when my oldest son, Grant, graduated from high school, so he only has a few pictures. (I'm NOT a scrapbooker). Luckily, I found Cherish Bound before my next son, Michael, graduated. I had a great time putting his book together. The first thing I did was his graduation pictures. You can either pay a ridiculous amount of money for one of the professional photo packages, OR you can take them yourself. All you need is a camera, an imagination, a graduate, and a nice place - like a park. I paid someone to do Grant's photos for graduation, but I did Michael's myself. I even took one of his friends, Stuart, to the park and did his pictures too. Here are a few of the great pics I took (if I do say so myself)...





Easy Peasy!! Right? I did change a few of the pictures - to sepia and black and white, etc., using Photoshop.
Instead of paying for expensive announcements, my friend, Carol, helped me Photoshop/InDesign some of my own. I won't say easy peasy here, because it wasn't easy - not for me - but for Carol, who is very talented, it was! We just used 5 of the photos I took and made this great announcement:

So, once that's done, you have them printed (mine were 5x7) and find some nice envelopes and send them out.

Your next photo session will be when you get the cap and gown - a few days before graduation. Make some time to take your graduate to another nice park for more pictures. (see above - Michael's pictures were taken on two different days). Here's one of my favorite photos from the cap and gown shoot I did:

Now, even though you might like this nice graduation book to be a gift on the day of graduation, you can't make it without the actual grad pics, so chill out and take tons of pictures (you might even want to wait until your son/daughter gets back from their senior trip and include those pics) and then work on the book after all the hullabaloo is over. You don't want to be without pics of the actual graduation, right?



Michael didn't really care about recording (in words) all of the fun things that happened during those last few months of school, so his graduation book had mostly pictures. I looked for great graduation quotes and added them here and there throughout the book. I also typed up an essay that Michael did his Senior year - what he had learned in each grade (Kindergarten through 12th grade). This was priceless. You can add anything you want into this book. Here is the cover - I Photoshopped one of the pictures that I took (I made it look like a watercolor - which took just one click of a button).

Michael loved the book! In fact, as a graduation gift for his two best friends, we put together a small graduation book for each of them as well!

And now that you have an idea for sharing those graduation memories, you can go back and do a book for each of your kids - just like I'm going to do for Grant. Here are a few of the fun pictures I'll use in his book:


You can even add some cute little boy pictures to start your book with:

I actually made a small "Graduates" book for me - with both Grant's and Michael's graduation pics. This cute picture was on the back of the book.

Don't forget - Cherish Bound stores your books, so any time you want a copy, just go online and order one. These graduation books are lovely gifts for grandparents, too!

Cherish Bound makes capturing and sharing important memories so easy. Good luck with your graduation books. Email me if you want a list of quotes you can use for graduation, or any other ideas. nafari01@yahoo.com

Cherish Bound - Simply Sharing Stories...

Making My Memories With Cherish Bound Books

Today's blog is about Cherish Bound books. My blog friend - over on The Misplaced Americans (to see her blog, go to my blog list, find it, and click)is interested in making a book with Cherish Bound. I really wish I was there in Brazil, so that I could show her some of the cool books I've made. But, I'm not. :-( So, I thought I'd take pictures of some of the books I've done and post them here so she could see all the wonderful possibilities! So, here we go...

This book is my very first book with Cherish Bound. It is the first installment of a collection of books about my son, Grant's, mission. There he is, the handsome devil!



This next book is my son, Michael's, graduation book. I photoshopped the picture on the front cover to look like a watercolor - pretty cool. This is a example of the black page background. Inside and out...




This set of small books is one of my favorites. I did these for 3 of my kids for Valentines day. These are some of my favorite pictures and stories of each of them. Here I'll show the covers, the inside of Alex's, and the back of Matthew's. They were all designed pretty much the same...





Next in line - books that I made for both of my grandmothers for Christmas. They are mostly picture books. It was a surprise, so I didn't get the chance to interview them about their lives - that's one of my next book projects (just text). I made these book look alike, so they'd look like a matched set on my parents' shelf. By the way, Cherish Bound archives all of the books people make, so if any of my cousins or Aunts and Uncles want a copy, they just have to go on to the CB website, plug in the number that is on the back of the book and order one. SWEET! This is one of CB's designer books - it's just lovely...




This is fun! It's like a fashion show for my books! You can look inside a few books on CB's website, but mine are cuter... hee, hee!

On to our next fun book. This one is a book about my dog, Cocoa. She's a beautiful chocolate Lab. This book was made using a "Legacy" design. I loved how the colors (browns, blues, etc.) highlighted the pictures...




This next book is my most recent book. My son Grant just came home from his Japanese mission and I wanted a gift to give him when he arrived. I took most of his pictures of landscapes and buildings in Japan (he is an INCREDIBLE photographer!) and made a book - each page is a full-bleed picture and there are no words. Believe me, the photos speak for themselves. Now he's got a professionally bound book for his portfolio. Oh yeah! Here's the cover and two of the inside spreads...





I finally decided that before all of my wedding photos were destroyed by time (fading), I'd get them into a book. This little book was super easy to make. I added some of the fun things we remembered about that day, along with the photographs (don't laugh at our hair - I know we were soooo 80s). The pic of the inside shows Rick and his best man, Glenn Morrell...




This last Christmas, I did books for a lot of the gifts I gave. I made a "cousins" book for my side of the family and one for Rick's side of the family as well. Here is the one of my side. The picture on the inside spread is of my dad being buried in sand by his grand kids! Fun times...




This next book was made for my son, Grant. He was the Sterling Scholar for Technology at Lone Peak High. He made a portfolio - each page done in Photoshop. I just took each of those pages and put them into the book full-bleed. It was the fastest, easiest book I've made - took me maybe a half hour...



My sister adopted a little girl from Guatemala last year. When they got home, we threw a baby shower for them. Using some journaling page from a kit I got at CB, I had each person write some advice for Kris and Ellie and then I took pictures of each person holding Ellie. I put it all together in a cute little book. This is another one of CB's "Legacy" designs - so fun, with the pink rose buds on the pages...




Last summer I ran a summer camp called "I'm An Author" - a Cherish Bound program that helps kids learn to write and illustrate their own books. This next book is the one my son, Matthew did for that camp. I love his stick figure illustrations...




When Grant was on his mission, I made a small book for him to use as an autograph book. I put small pictures from his mission and quotes from his letters home, but left plenty of space around those for people to write. I got both a softbound and a hardbound book. I just looked through the hardbound - which is the one I sent to him. It looks so cool with all of the different notes in there - some are written in Japanese Kanji. The pics of the outside of the book are of the softbound copy...





This is a spread from my "Power of Story" book - a book that anyone who signs up to be a CB consultant gets to make for free. It's a fun little book where you can share a few pictures and stories of your own (yep, that's me - I was a little cutie-pie, huh?)...



This picture is of a small graduation book I made using photos from my two oldest sons' high school graduation. I made it as a sample book for my CB business. The book on the bottom is my "Power of Story" book. The inside spread is from the graduation book - Grant and a good friend, Brady...




Two more books to show you. This one is a special book. When Grant left on his mission, I started a newsletter called "Ye Elders of Israel" - with 28 missionaries. Each month a newsletter was mailed out (with the help of the other families) to each missionary. This is how they kept in touch. This little book, called "We Testify" was a project of mine - each missionary sent me his testimony in English and in the language he was speaking. I also got testimonies from about 20 of the girls they all went to school with. I put them all into a book and CB published it. Each missionary got one of these. It allowed them to share testimonies of their friends all over the world. The inside spread is Grant's. His testimony is in English, Kanji, and Romagi...




Last book (this isn't all I've made - I've made over 35 of my own and 20 of my students)... This is perhaps one of my favorites. It was made using one of Cherish Bound's designer series. It is our vacation to Northern California. I've shown two spreads from inside, because I wanted you to see how colorful the inside is... the yellow page listed each family member's favorite thing about the vacation. FUN!






Well, that's it. I hope you all enjoyed the fashion show. If you are interested in making beautiful books of your own, let me know. Email me at nafari01@yahoo.com or kara@cherishbound.com.

Share those memories...

Cherish Bound book idea: Overcoming Challenges

We all have challenges and trials in our lives. I think it's important to record what those challenges are and how we have overcome them. One of the things I like about Cherish Bound is that it offers a simple way to record those challenges and triumphs. My book idea/suggestion for this week involves a book that I just finished and one that I intend to write soon.

My cousin, Sara, and her husband, Stephano, welcomed a beautiful baby girl to their family last year. She was born too early and has had heart problems since the beginning. In order to keep everyone informed about Baby Stella's condition (she spent several months at Primary Children's Hospital), they used an online journal. I kept up with Baby Stella faithfully - reading their daily posts. A few weeks after they started journaling, I decided that I wanted to do a book for them about Stella's difficult journey - this was a story that needed to be told. Over the course of a few months, I've cut and pasted all of their journal entries into a book, using the online tool at Cherish Bound. I added pictures as they posted them. I just finished their book today, and I'm so excited to give it to them. What an important time in Stella young life and how wonderful that when she gets older, she can sit down with this beautiful book and read the words of her mother and father - learning how much they went through, how strong she was, and what an incredible family she belongs to. I didn't add one word - Sara and Stephano provided a beautiful description of that trying time. It's been one of the easiest books I've done (so simple to just cut and paste and upload pictures), but one of the most beautiful. I can't wait to see their faces when they get it.

Have you ever been through a trials and thought maybe your experiences would help someone else? Well, then, write those experiences down! I've been battling breast cancer for 8 months. The lessons I've learned about overcoming difficulties, as well as the strength I've gain, will hopefully help my children and grandchildren someday. That's why I've decided to start working on my own story about overcoming challenges.

If you don't know how to go about writing your story, Cherish Bound has a wonderful tool called a Story Starter that can help. Each Story Starter is full of questions to get your thoughts flowing, and sample quotes and stories. We have over 35 Story Starters - and there is one just for the subject I've been talking about. It's called: A Change In Plans.

Here are a few sample questions from A Change In Plans:
1. Describe the day that you learned about your disability or condition.
2. What was your initial reaction?
3. Did your life permanently change as a result of this condition?
4. Define courage. Define patience.

So, can you see how just having a few questions to think about can help you start to write your story? I love these story starters. Especially because the questions help me remember things that I wouldn't remember otherwise.

Challenge: Go ahead... think of a time in your life when you've been faced with a challenge and start writing. And remember: if you need help telling your story, or want to buy one of Cherish Bound's incredible tools, contact me at kara@cherishbound.com. Ask me about the Power of STORY!

My Story Moments - preserved with the help of Cherish Bound. Here's an idea for Christmas...

I'm sitting here working on books for Christmas gifts and thought I'd give you an incredible idea for a gift...

I work for a company called Cherish Bound. I LOVE this company. Cherish Bound is the reason I decided to start this blog page. I wanted to record my story moments. Everyone has 1000s of story moments and memories they should record. Cherish Bound is a home-based business, with consultants who help you find, capture, and share your precious stories. What sets Cherish Bound apart from any other book-making company is that we have a full line of products to help you tell your stories. We have Story Starters (workbooks with tons of questions, to get those memories flowing), Chat Cards (a fun family activity), Dailies (journaling pages), and Lifeprints (pages that help you gather information from other people). These are just a few of the wonderful and helpful products that Cherish Bound has. Go to www.cherishbound.com and look under products to see everything. Cherish Bound has a very easy online publishing tool (nothing to buy - nothing to "sign up" for). Just super easy to use. We are about 30% cheaper than any other company out there, and 100% better quality. I love how Cherish Bound helps me to make a beautiful, simple, heirloom quality book every time.

So, here's the idea I promised: for Valentine's Day last year, I decided that I'd make a book for each one of my kids called, Mom's Top Ten Favorite Pictures of (kid's name). Cherish Bound offers this really fun, cute little designer book called Top Ten, and I thought it would be perfect for these gifts. So, I went down to my HUGE box of pictures (yep, I'm one of those moms - no scrapbooking for me) and started to go through memories. When I finished gathering pictures, there were way more than just 10 each. There were more like 30-40! So, I decided to just design my own books. The covers were red (the perfect color for Valentine's AND Christmas), with the cutest pictures I could find: Alex's showed a picture of him in his jammies with a Batman cape on, sucking on his beloved binky. Michael's was a picture of him in his Ronald McDonald pjs, with a huge grin on his face. And Matthew's picture showed him helping me decorate a tree with lights - no smile - just that sweet, serious, kissable baby face. Before Grant left on his mission, we took family pictures. I had one taken individually with each of my kids. Those pictures went on the backs of their books, with a "love" note from Mom.

It took me about 1/2 hour to scan all of the pictures in, 1/2 hour to throw them all into the publishing tool and place them where I wanted them, and 1/2 hour to go through and add the stories I could remember. No time at all! It was so easy.

My boss, Carol, told me what would happen when the kids got their books. She said "Don't feel bad if they just say 'Thanks, Mom' and take them to their rooms. If you go peek in on them later, they'll be looking at every page and reading every story." Well, she was kind of right. I put their books out on the table, with balloons and candy, and when they got home from school, I gave them their gifts. They immediately opened their books and spent the next 1/2 hour going through every page. They laughed their heads off at the funny pictures I loved and read every single story. They couldn't put the books down! After reading a story about a surgery he had, Matthew said "Mom, you never told me what that was called!" The questions flew - where, what, who, etc. It was so fun. Just priceless. There is nothing you could give your kids or other loved ones, that is more special than a book that chronicles their lives. It means so much when you realize that your life is as important to other people as it is to you.

Well, the gifts were a hit! Everyone loved them. And the best part was that it didn't take a long time to do! It takes even less time if you have digital pictures - no scanning involved. Christmas is coming up FAST and the publishing deadline for Christmas delivery is coming up soon. If you are interested in doing a special memory book for anyone in your family, please contact me at kara@cherishbound.com and I'll help you get started immediately. Don't wait - you'll want to see the priceless looks on your families faces when they open their books - trust me. Start preserving your story moments now!

Want An Idea For An Incredible Christmas Gift? Read On...

I'm sitting here working on my Christmas gifts - books made at Cherish Bound - and thought I'd post something about this great company I work for. I LOVE this company. Cherish Bound is the reason I decided to start a blog. Everyone has 1000s of stories and we all want to be remembered when we are no longer here. Cherish Bound can help! Cherish Bound is a home-based business with consultants who can help you find, capture, and share your important stories. We have a full line of story "helps", including Story Starters (books with tons of questions to get your mind moving), Chat Cards, Dailies (journaling pages), Lifeprints (pages to help gather information from others), and lots more. We have so many wonderful products! To see the full line, go to www.cherishbound.com, and look under Products. Cherish Bound also has an online publishing tool (no cost to use - nothing to "sign up" for). It's the easiest online tool I've ever used. And I love how Cherish Bound helps me focus on making my memory books simple and beautiful - real heirloom quality. But, these books are so much more than picture books. Focusing on stories in your books will make them a cherished gift for your family.

So, since Christmas is coming up FAST, and our books are SO EASY and FAST to make, I thought I'd give you an idea for a fun gift for your kids: last year, for Valentine Day, I decided to make a small (5x7) book for each of my kids. It would include Mom's Top Ten Favorite Photos of (kid's name). Cherish Bound has this adorable Top Ten book that I thought would be perfect! So I got my HUGE box of pictures out and started to go through them. My only problem was that I couldn't choose just ten pictures for each of my kids! I ended up with about 30 pictures each! So, I decided to design my own book instead of using the Top Ten book. I made the covers red (for Valentine's day - but that could be fine for Christmas as well!). On the front covers I put the cutest picture I could find for each child. Alex's was a picture of him dressed in pajamas and a Batman cape, with a binky stuck in his mouth, Michael's was a great picture of him in Ronald McDonald pjs and a huge grin, and Matthew's was a picture of him helping me string lights on a tree at Christmas time. No smile, just a sweet, serious baby look. We had family pictures taken the year before, when Grant left for his mission, and at that time I had a picture taken individually with each of my kids. These pictures went on the back of each of their books, with a "love" note from mom. These books were so much fun to make. It took perhaps 1/2 hour to scan all of the pictures into my computer, another 1/2 hour to throw the pics into the publishing tool and place them. And then another 1/2 hour to go through and add stories that the pictures reminded me of. Not long at all!

My boss, Carol, told me to be prepared - the kids will says "Thanks, Mom" and flip through the book fast and then put them away. But, she said that if I went up to their rooms later, I'd find them looking through the books more carefully. She was kind of right. I had the books laying out on the table, with candy and balloons attached, when they got home from school. I gave them the gifts. Each one of them sat down, right there, and poured over every picture, every story, the whole book! They laughed their heads off at the funny pictures that I loved. After reading about the story of a surgery he had, Matthew said, "Mom, you never told me it was called that!" The whole experience was so incredible. Photos and memories are much more important in a child's life - or an adult's life for that matter - than anything else. The fact that someone remembers enough and cares enough to put everything down into a beautifully bound book that will last forever - that's a priceless gift.

So, go look through those memories - and call me. I'd love to help get you started. The deadline for Christmas delivery is coming up very soon, but it doesn't take long to make a small, simple, wonderful book. So, don't let that stop you. Our prices here at Cherish Bound are about 30% cheaper than anywhere else, and our quality is 100% better. You'll love your books. These little books make great stocking stuffers. You might not even make it to opening the rest of your presents! Haha!

Email me at kara@cherishbound.com or call me at 801-360-4666. Don't let this opportunity to give the perfect gift get away. Do it now! Record some magical story moments!!