A New Idea for Autographs

[bonrea]

Question: If I am making my own autograph book, would they still spiral bind it?

I am in the process of making a special Christmas edition for my Dec 2012 trip and have been wondering where and how to get it bound for ease while at Disney.

http://www.shutterfly.com/

Click on Photo Books

 

[sasquatch]

I ordered 3 books and it took abc forvever to ship. i finally got them but I was sweating that they would not come in time. staples has a quick turnaround time for binding (thank goodness). the books are fantastic though...even DH was impressed!!!

I called ABC Distributing on Thursday to order this. They told me they had plenty in stock, but for some reason could not place my order. Seems like a company that does not have their act together. I'm going to try again today.

 

[mnmhouston]

My mom had a great idead and I thought I'd share. You may recall from my earlier posts that DD7 didn't want to wait on lines for autographs and DD2 was afraid of them so we ended up with minimal signed pages. I was telling my mom that we would leave the book with our "bring to disney stuff" to be used on future trips. She suggested I find her old autograph books and "send our new book away to disney" to get the autographs she has gotten in the past into the new book! Awesome idea, now just need to find the old books and "forge" the autographs.

She'll be thrilled, maybe a great Santa gift on xmas morn.

 

[sasquatch]

I ordered two books online from ABC Distributing, today, September 21, 2010. The message states that it should in 5 - 10 business days. So, I'll post with an update after I receive the books.

 

[sasquatch]

Just wanted to let readers know that I received the books from abc distributing on Thursday, September 30. I ordered on 9/21, so it took seven business days.

These books are not light. After ordering them, I am reconsidering if I will use them for autograph books. The concept of having the autographs in the encyclopedia is awesome, but my children are ages six and five, so they won't be lugging them along.

 

[nicki.momof3]

I agree they are heavy and my children are also young so I would be carrying the heavy book and their stuff - to much.

I do love the idea. We are going to have the characters sign the regular autograph book and then glue them into the big book after the trip.

 

[jtink60]

We just came back from a great trip and this time we took a white pillowcase and a black sharpie. I took a 5X7 piece of cardboard to slip into the pillowcase so that the sharpie didn't bleed through and to give the characters a writing surface. It turned out great. We have the pillowcase full of signatures on both sides. Minnie signed in a red sharpie that she had. She signed right in the middle with all the other characters around it. The CM's and other people in line really liked it, too. Now it sits on her bed and she reads the names all the time. She even took it for show and tell.

 

[bear74]

This was exactly my own thought. I think I'm going to get this book, bring it to Staples, and have them add some extra sheets. What I might even do is by the appropriate card stock and print illustrations of the missing characters on them, and then insert them in alpha order in the book, and then have it spiral bound. Then I'd add a few extra blank pages on the end.

love this idea. I was thinking of using some of the autograph pages that are designed on the Creative design thread, but this would be easier. We will have 2 strollers so not worried about caring it around.

 

[DisneyDorkORama]

awesome!

 

[PrinceCharmingsMom]

Just ordered from Amazon with 2 day shipping and wondering if anyone knows of any of the other characters that are in the parks that aren't in the book. My DS is in love with Tiana so I am going to make her a page and wondering if I should do that for any others?

 

[sasquatch]

Just ordered from Amazon with 2 day shipping and wondering if anyone knows of any of the other characters that are in the parks that aren't in the book. My DS is in love with Tiana so I am going to make her a page and wondering if I should do that for any others?

I have heard that the new characters from Tangled are now appearing in the parks, and they aren't going to be in the book. Otherwise, I'm not sure.

 

[krzykramer]

This is a great idea, all the pages done and ready for you. It's helpful so you can check off the characters you have already seen, you won't have to wait twice!

I have made my girls books every time we go. At first I made all the characters I could think of, and many of the pages didn't get signed (as would happen with this book). I have learned to stream-line my books to include only the characters I know we will see, and bring extra pages for the characters to sign that I didn't pre-plan for. I also make them 6x6 so they are easier to manage.

I also make my books with one side for the signature, and the other side for their photo with the character (to be added later). My 6 year old pulls out her books all the time and loves to see herself with the character! I know she will treasure it!

I am a paper crafter so I go a bit over board, but if you're not, there are so many options in the DIsigners area of this site. Save the images and use the Sam's Wharehouse or Walmart photo department book maker program on thier sites to make yours!

 

[PrinceCharmingsMom]

Too funny...I was working on the Tangled ones this morning when I read this. It came yesterday took it to Fedex Office they bound it and laminated it also added the pages I made for Tangled and Princess Frog. It was $10.13 and I had gotten it from Amazon for $12 with free shipping so it was here in 2 days and it's done and ready to pack for our trip! Thanks again!

I also added a page for the Little Einsteins with Handy Manny and a Bear page with OSO, Duffy and Lotso since he is at Hollywood Studios.

 

[sasquatch]

I am reporting back to those curious about rebinding this book, and making additions. This is what I did.

Step 1
Using the excellent designs created by ChaosCent (Penny) in the CreativeDISigns forum, I printed, on 32lb. paper, autographs cards for
Tiana and Naveen (on the same page)
Flynn and Repunzel (on the same page)
Handy Manny and JoJo/Goliath (on the same page)
The four Little Einsteins (on the same page)
Cinderella's Castle (as a background to a blank page)
I also added a few extra blank pages.

Step 2
I brought the books (I have two), the autograph pages I printed, and the blank pages to Staples.
I had Staples
a) cut the binding on the existing book
b) laminate the front cover and back cover
c) cut my own autograph pages to size so they would fit the new book
d) add my own autograph pages to the end of the book, after the index
e) remove the sticker page at the end of the book
f) rebind the book with a spiral binding
That cost around $17 total for the two (2) books.

Step 3 (the best part)
Brought the book home and enjoyed watching my children easily flip through the book.

The book can now lay flat, or easily be folder to a specific page for autographs.

I'll find out in less than 72 hours how well it works at the parks. The book is around 170 pages, so it is not a lightweight. I'll be stuck lugging them around in my backpack.

I also plan on getting a two-gallon size zip-lock plastic bag to keep the books in, so they are protected from inclement weather.

 

[dfluvsmick]

This may have already been mentioned, but we did something a few years ago on a trip and we love it. First of all, the autograph books my kids did when they were younger always seemed to get misplaced or ruined or something. I saw this idea once, we did it. AWESOME!!! Go to any craft store and buy one of those autograph frames. Have everyone autograph it and then you can frame it when you are home and put your picture (in front of the castle is what we did) in it. Now it can hang on your wall for years and you will see the autographs ALL the time!!!
It really wasn't that bad carrying it around...especially if you have a stroller to put it in while you don't need it!!!

 

[sasquatch]

So, just back from our trip and the Disney Junior Encyclopedia of Animated Characters worked out great! We saw a few other people with the book too, but without the binding modification that I had done.

The book is heavy, which made for transferring between DS (5) and DD (6) to the characters awkward at times. It's just hard from someone their age to handle the size and weight of that book and a marker at the same time. Typically, the kids would take the book to the character, they would sign, give back to the kids, and the kids would hand over the marker and book to either me or my spouse before they posed for photos. Fortunately, I had pre-paid for the Photopass cd, so for any character to which a photographer was assigned, I did not have to worry about taking my own photograph. I'd say there was a photographer for about 60% of the characters we met.

We met about 50 characters, and the only ones that didn't have their own page in the book were:
Princess Tiana
Prince Naveen
Little Einsteins
Handy Manny
(For the four above, I had made pages for them and inserted at the end of the book before I had the book rebound.)
Terk (Tarzan)
Lotso (Toy Story 3)
Mary Poppins
(These three signed blank pages.)
Rafiki (had him sign on Simba's page, where there is a picture of Rafiki and Simba)
We did not get to meet the stars from Tangled, and of course, they are not in the book either.

We used a Bic "Mark-It" permanent market, which was selling at Staples for $0.99 and comes in a variety of colors. There was no bleeding through the pages.

 

[mnmhouston]

Looking forward to adding sigs to our book again in August!

Need to have the cover re-laminated though as the edges are coming apart.

Our hope is to keep the book going for years to come and collect all of the sigs we possibly can.

 

[mnmhouston]

Forgot to mention, I just saw this book today on Lakeside.com on sale for $3.95 from $5.95!

 

[bonrea]

We ordered the Encyclopedia books from Amazon, I took them to Kinkos and had the binding changed and the front and back covers laminated. The books are a bit heavy for carrying around all day but my DW came up with a great solution. She wanted to get the girls a little Welcome To WDW gift so she got them both monogramed black draw string backpacks, and guess what; the books fit in it perfectly. The girls had NO problem carrying the books in the back packs and had other things with them as well.

She ordered the back packs from http://www.disneyflorist.com and they put them in the room for us while we were at DTD.

When the characters saw themselves in the books they went nuts. Pooh saw it and jumped for joy and tried to show it to Tigger. Tigger ignored him and Pooh showed signs of crying to the crowd and they got after Tigger for it. It was great fun and it made the character meetings that much more special. Alice [Alice In Wonderland} spent 10 minutes with us just looking through the book and even brought all the characters in the restaurant over to look as well. It was so much fun.
Here is a picture of the girls with the back packs:

 

[Bruner1978]

Great idea!!