Homemade Books: Peek-a-Bia!

Welcome back to Favorite Book Friday! Let's continue our series on homemade books, personalized with your family's photos to add a special touch. If you missed the first book in this series, Our Bible ABC Book, simply click on the title to see the post.

Today's featured book is Sofia's favorite book, Peek-a-Bia! Since Kardelen already had a Who Loves Kardelen? book (which will be a later part of this series), we wanted to make Sofia her own photo book for Christmas last year. And it was a hit!

The book has a peek-a-boo format, where part of a photo peeks through the page before it. We chose pictures of Sofia that had other interesting elements that could peek through the pages, like a teddy bear, Eeyore, and an auntie. :) The entire text is "Peek a. . .Bia!" Would you like to look inside? (Please excuse the slight glare from my camera's flash. It was tricky to take pictures of shiny pages!)



Then we turn the page and say "Bia!" on the next page. She always smiles widely!

And another:

Want to give it a try to bless a special child in your life? Let me give you a few suggestions. First, choose a small photo album that holds one photo on each page. (Thanks to my sister-in-law Kari for this sweet one!)

Be sure the pages can be made clear by taking out the paper centers. Otherwise, the book won't "peek"!

Choose pictures for your book, then cut out the same number of 4-by-6 pieces of paper. Play around with colors, patterns, scrapbook paper--be creative! Once these are chosen, match each one to a picture and decide how to cut out the "peek" window. My favorite cut-outs were a teddy bear and the flower you saw above.

Slide the papers and photos into the sleeves, and you're done! This book is simple, fun, and inexpensive to make, and makes a unique gift for the child you choose to bless. And that child will feel like a star!

If you'd rather simply check out a library book, Peek-A Who? by Nina Laden is a clever peek-a-boo board book suitable for even the youngest readers.

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Have you ever made anything like this? Do you have any other homemade book ideas to share? I'd love to hear them!