How to Make Your Own Photo Paper Notepad

I am going to show you how to make your own photo paper notepad.  It's super easy!  All you need is Elmer's Glue, clothespins, printer paper, a computer, digital photos, cardboard mailer envelopes or other thin cardboard.

If you like paper stationery products like me, then this may be your next project.  I love photo notepads made by companies like Shutterfly and Snapfish, but they can be on the pricey side.  So I decided to make up my own version of a photo notepad that can be used for the myriad of lists that mothers tend to generate (grocery lists, to do lists, wish lists, shopping lists, etc.). 

This project is also a good way to use up old cardboard photo mailer envelopes or other thin cardboard around the house.  I decided to use some old Shutterfly photo mailers for this project to serve as the cardboard back to the notepad.

All I did was make up a template in Microsoft Word with two columns dividing the document in half.  Then I added horizontal lines all the way down.  I inserted a photo at the top and sized it down to about 1" by 1.5" to make a small rectangle.  You can either paste the same picture on both columns or use another picture for the other column.  Then just print out about 15 copies (depending on how many sheets you want for your notepad because this will generate 30 sheets for your notepad). If you have a paper cutter, that will work great for this project, otherwise you can just use scissors and a lot of patience to cut out each rectangle.  I used a paper cutter and just cut 3-4 sheets at a time.  I used to do cut these out by hand with scissors, but my cutting isn't all that straight and it just took too long! The paper cutter is my shortcut to perfectly straight edges and a more finished look to the notepad.  Plus, my son was able to help me cut the paper with the paper cutter, so this was a fun project for both of us!

After experimenting with making notepads for a while, I finally decided to try to put a cardboard back on the notepad to make it look even more finished.  All I did was cut out the Shutterfly cardboard mailer envelope to the size of the notepad and used Elmer's glue to glue it on the back.  Basically, the cardboard backing just became another piece of paper in the pad.  I just glued the top of the pad and used clothespins to hold it tightly together until the glue dried. 

I do not have a color laser printer, so I just printed my sheets in black and white, which is fine for everyday use.  If you want to spruce up these notepads and give them as gifts, you can splurge and use color ink for your photos.

The glue only gets applied to the top of the pad in a thin even layer and it takes a few hours to dry.  When it does finally dry, the glue becomes translucent and looks like a regular old notepad you'd buy at the store! I check on the pad every few hours and just squeeze it tightly with my fingers to make sure the papers are sticking together and the glue is evenly distributed.  I even stuck a few of these in front of the fireplace to help speed up the drying process.

See, that was easy!  I hope this project has inspired you to make your own stationery products and use your own creativity to reuse items, such as cardboard mailers, for your next art project.