the final present

My attempts at homemade Christmas presents kind of failed. Wait. Am I talking about Christmas in February? You got that right, sister. I finally, finally completed my sister’s Christmas present and was relieved to finally deliver it when we went up to visit this weekend. I had seen the idea a year or so ago, promptly forgot the site with the template, decided I wished I remembered, begged and pleaded anyone I could think of who might know where to direct me, and then, and an answer to prayer, found what I was looking for. And that was the easy part. I’m still learning the intricacies of Photoshop, and while I really want us to be BFFs and braid each other’s hair while watching Girls Just Want to have Fun, our relationship has been nothing if not rocky as Photoshop refuses to behave like any other program I’m familiar with. Woe is me, I know. (Side note, if any of you know a good web site that has Photoshop tutorials, please direct me.) Anyway, after hours of work, then rework once I realized I’d created everything with a sucky resolution, and then with guidance from a genius coworker in transferring the files from Photoshop to Illustrator to Adobe, I was finally able to print and glue. But, oh! The books. The books. The books. I thought using blank board books was genius until I realized that there is no where in the greater Kansas City area where you can walk in a buy them, and that if you call a store because they show them in stock online but the store tells you they don’t have them in the store, you shouldn’t go to that store thinking the phone girl was mistaken because you might end up spending an hour sorting through dirty books with the misplaced hope that somehow one ended up in the bargain bin without any employees noticed. And then you will get mad and hate Christmas.
I ended up ordering the books online, and was happy (Happy!) to read that they were the perfect number of pages for a complete alphabet and then sad (Sad!) when they arrived and I realized they were counting each page twice, those sneakers. Oh, and the glue. Good nelly, you would think it would be easier to find a reasonably priced paper adhesive that would also work as a top finishing coat. Trial and error. I was able to glue the paper down, but no top coat.

Blah blah blah, I’m finished and I’m pleased with the final result. The whole process has taken so much emotion and time that nothing short of my sister and her family jumping for joy and singing loudly the praises of my good work would have made me feel like it was worth it. Um. It wasn’t worth it. I think she already has a few books with the alphabet, and I think she might like those ones better. Oh well. Live and learn. Buy from China.