Tuesday, June 5, 2012

Library Plates for You and Me

Yesterday we took a family trip out to visit my grandparents. We make the 1 hour drive every month or so. It is great to recharge our batteries, enjoy some time together without distraction (except for our last trip which had quite a lot of excitement when a mare give birth during our lunch!) and to remind our selves to take some time to recognize the simple things.

{ life in the country side }

The reason for our trip yesterday was also a pick up. My grandfather is a treasure hunter by nature, so I know this trait is ingrained in my very DNA. He finds the neatest people, the most interesting places and the coolest things for me. If nothing else, the experiences alone are worth it all! But yesterday he had tracked down some pretty cool items for me so we headed out there. Now I have some interesting items for upcoming DIY projects as well as staging Lexington.

{ Wren's friends when we visit }

Speaking of DIY projects, I dedicated myself to one last week that I've been wanted to finish. I bought these book plates last December and started mounting them in my growing collection of old books. But I was surprised how far they went, in the sense that I only got through about a quarter of my books. Plus it took forever because I still had to write my name on each plate. Since then the project has taken a back seat and I thought I'd wait until I found some new plates. The I debated getting a custom stamp made, and while that is not all that expensive (the custom stamps I've bought on etsy usually range from $20-$30) I figured I could do it all for less on my own.

{ I LOVE my old books. Each one is read, loved and shared }
 

My only purchase was a pack of adhesive paper ($8 on sale at Staples). The rest was some simple computer magic.

I designed a plate I liked and added my signature, then put them into a Word document. There may be an easier way, but I am most comfortable with Word so I simply turned it into a 3 column page, minimized the margins to .25 inches all around and started pasting my plate image. 

{ computers: not my strong suit }

Once I had a few sheets printed I whipped out the Cricut paper cutter and cut the plates into individual stickers. I was able to fit 15 plates on a sheet and there were 10 sheets so that is 150 book plates for only $8. MUCH more affordable than my anthro ones. And I like that I can customize them!


The fun part was mounting them all, specially in those books that have plates from previous owners. Some old plates dated back to 1926! Note to self: next time maybe add the year on the plate. 
 
After all the books were plated I had the task of replacing them all into my library cabinet. So I did a little sorting and took all the unread books and put them upstairs on my nightstand. The rest were put in backwards to create less visual clutter... yes it sounds crazy. And it definitely is. 

{ but it looks cool to me }

If you are interested in creating some order to your book collection here is a blank plate in the exact dimensions I used so just adjust your word document according to the specifications above, copy and paste this image and print! If you want to have a personalized signature like mine simply scan a sample of your handwriting and cut and paste it into place using Paint or another program you're familiar with, or even just type it in if you want. 




Have fun my fellow librarians!

6 comments:

Unknown said...

cute library plates! my husband always wants these, but the custom ones are crazy expensive. thanks for sharing i may need to make some of these for him!

Emily said...

Very cool! Thanks for sharing! Could you tell me what the font is that you used for "Personal Library"? I've been trying to track it down!

Lindsey said...

Cute! I put all my books backwards too. My husband thinks I'm crazy.

Barbara said...

Cool book plates that must have been awesome to see the first steps of that little foal.

Rachel Schofield - Virtual Interior Decorator & Home Stager said...

Beautiful & touching entry. Gorgeous photos of you and your Wren.

Rebeccarama said...

i put all my books like this too after i saw them do it in pottery barn. and then i always get comments from people who think it's weird, but i still like it.

 
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