things I love about you | the perfect gift for the love of your life

It gets more challenging every year to find the perfect birthday, anniversary and Christmas gifts for the love of your life, doesn't it? It might just be that we all have more than we could ever need or use. But, after eighteen years of marriage and a few years of dating, a handmade gift always seems to be just the perfect idea...at least that's been my experience.

My guy loves them and I love making them for him.

Things I Love About You

I've always dabbled in homemade gifts and cards and much prefer gifting something handmade than anything at all. And as has happened many times in the past {here, this one, and this one, too}, gifts that have begun as gifts to my Sweetie, have ended up as some of my most popular shop products. Yeah, Mr. wRight gets some pleasure of reminding me of that. 

When I was designing some new inserts for the shop, I had some extra space on the page. Since Gordon's birthday was just around the corner, and I had no idea what to get him, I decided to make something for him. And he loved it.

Mr. wRight gave me the okay to share the journal I gifted him, so here we go.
Well, actually, he said, "I guess you're going to want to take photos and put this on your blog." So, yeah, I think that means he's totally okay with me letting you see how I showed him some of the things I love about him.

THINGS I LOVE ABOUT HIM
When beginning on a mini book project, it can seem a little daunting. All those blank pages and will I ever come up with enough things I love about him that I haven't already shared in other mini books I've given him.

Another fun thing I like to do, is to highlight a word in my journaling with letter stickers. The added bonus is that it takes up room when my journaling doesn't really take up the whole card.

USING STAMPS 
The left side of the page has the folded over journaling card from the page before {the tree card} and a "W" sticker, as our last name begins with the letter W. Now is a good time to grab some stamps to embellish your page. You can see what a terrible stamper I am, the word "is" was double stamped. But, oh well, it's handmade, not perfect.

And a few more pages where I stamped:

And if you're part of a couple, a team, you know that there are tough days. But they only make us stronger.

To cover up the staples in the middle page spread here, I adhered a paper doily {find more here} on top of the spritz splatter pattern and a stamp of one of my mantras.

Another example of my terrible stamping skills.



Who doesn't love a mason jar? I think back to my younger days when we ran after lightening bugs on late Summer nights. All my hand drawn hearts remind me of those lightening bugs and the brightness my sweetie brings to my life.

One of my favorite pages comes up next. The first time Gordon read through his gift, he didn't even realize that he should have lifted up the King playing card...

...for the secret message underneath. Well, not really so super secret, he does know that he is the King of my heart. And has been for a very long time.

And it all came together with this awesome gold heart washi tape. I'm hoarding this one, for sure!

JOURNALING CARDS
One of my favorite ways to jump start a journal page is to use a journaling card, which seems to spark my creativity and help me to begin to tell my story.

Gordon just happens to be 7 years younger than me, so how could I not use this card?

The sticker I used for the word "or" is actually covering up a handwriting boo boo.

The Story of Today...a perfect jump off point.

Inside jokes...he's always up for a birthday cake and it doesn't matter if it has someone else's name on it, either.

We lost Papa, Gordon's Dad, nearly three years ago in March. He was a larger than life character, loved by his family and his community. We still miss him. And I know that Papa would continue to be proud of the way his eldest son is shouldering the responsibilities , taking care of Nana, the property and the family.

And another round sticker to cover up a handwriting boo boo. Hey, whatever works!

Commitment. That's what it's all about, it goes back to the promise we made to each other.

Another flip card, hiding a chipboard element.

Yes! Again and again and again. Best decision I ever made!

I used some wood chip shapes, the same ones I used here, because they are not too fancy and are a little bit rustic. And cute.

USING YOUR STASH
I often tell Gordon that I'm the lucky one...so the clover washi tape just seemed to be right.

No words. Just and arrow pointing to the ampersand. Like you & me.

You may or may not know that Gordon sings. He sings wonderfully, with a deep, rich voice that makes everyone who hears him sing wonder why he doesn't do it professionally. Yep, he's that good.

glassine bags | shipping tags

This heart shaped page tab seen below is included with the notebook kit.

FLAIR BUTTONS 
I first journaled a list of things I love about him. Then I saw that there was room at the top of the page and decided to add the word you with letter stickers to fill it up. The letter stickers are green, like the darker green stripe in the pennant sticker shape on the left page.

WATERCOLORS
I've recently been playing around with the watercolor set my girls use. Gosh, they're so much fun. I grabbed a few stencils I've had in my stash but never used and played around to create these page backgrounds.

The arrow outline is the negative shape from a yardstick sticker sheet that I just trimmed around and stuck to the page.

He CAN fix anything. It's amazing, I don't know how he does it.

SOURCES
Looking for fun embellishments to decorate your mini album and travelers notebook pages? I have a whole collection of kits charming bits and bobbles curated by color.

Want to buy the same notebook I used for this post? Find the pocket sized Love journal here, it even has an optional embellishment kit to help you decorate your pages.