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Most tots love alphabet books, but moms can get a little burnt-out reading ‘A is Apple’ everyday. That’s why when I found out about Shutterfly’s make-your-own custom alphabet books, I got super excited! Finally, I could combine my passion for scrapbooking and taking copious pictures of my child, with the necessity of reading alphabet books — and create an alphabet photo book totally focused around my adorable son. Now my son can read an alphabet book all about his life – filled with photos of him engaged in different activities. All children learn most naturally when educational material is made relevant to their daily lives – and what could be more relevant than an ABC book highlighting all of my son’s favorite things and people?

Luckily for me, Shutterfly allowed me to test drive the DIY make-your-own book experience as part of a campaign they are running to promote this new feature. And I have to say, in all honesty, that the process of creating and ordering an alphabet book from Shutterfly was a lot of fun. It felt like a combination of creating a scrapbook, and designing a childrens book – but with no scissors and double-sided tape required. The Shutterfly book-design interface is pretty easy to use, although the user interface took a bit of getting used to. In total I probably spent about 2-3 hours creating this custom-designed alphabet book for my son, Petey. Putting the whole book together was a snap – most of my time was spent deciding which picture to use for each letter of the alphabet.

My son and I are both thrilled with the end result of the custom alphabet book, ‘The ABCs of Petey.’ The printing and binding is very professional, and that makes a huge difference in the ‘feel’ of a book. It is very cool to see your child’s face gracing the cover of a hard bound book that looks like it came from a book store, and this professional looking quality makes your child feel special. (We all know that toddlers’ egos need more stoking!)

I’m excited to try this out again with another style of book. There are tons of options for make-your-own DIY books from Shutterfly, from standard photo albums to alphabet books, adventure books, and even books that allow your child to take on the role of his or her favorite cartoon character (Dora anyone?). I’m addicted and will be working on my next custom photo book soon.

We’ll be giving away a bunch of Shutterfly Make-Your-Own Photo Books on Inhabitots as part of this campaign, so if you are interested in getting one, stay tuned for the next post!

+ Shutterfly Custom Alphabet Books

+ Shutterfly Custom Make-Your-Own Books