Wedding Guestbook with Photos

DIY Guestbooks are one of the searches most often coming to my blog. One of the details of our wedding that we now treasure is our DIY guestbook. Mine is the Polaroid type that is gaining popularity now. They are selling them also at a high price on the internet, but I decided to just do my own.

Here is a picture of the cover. I bought this wirebound book at Michaels, pasted an aqua sheet of paper on the cover, then put the scrapbooking stickers to decorate. I was tickled pink with the outcome.



We had two types of guestbooks, the traditional version and the photo version. I spent a lot of time deliberating over traditional type guestbook to buy. I'm calling the traditional guestbook the type that says "Guests" on the outside and a bunch of lines on the inside. They range from $9.99 at Michaels to $200.00 for a beautiful silk bound book. In the end, I realized that the traditional guestbook wasn't going to mean much to me so I opted for the Michael's version for $9.99. After all, it only has your guests names and addresses in it. It is not worth it to spend a lot of money on this type of sign-in guestbook because once you open the book to sign you lose the appeal of the outside. Most of the pages on the inside look the same. And honestly, are you going to be looking at it often, or ever? Like all things related to a wedding, this is another "essential" where they try to price gouge you. Usually there is a pen that accompanies it, which is usually a crappy ballpoint that doesn't write well. In my opinion, the pen is also not worth it.

To pull this off, you need a friend who is willing to take charge of this project at the wedding. Thank you Renee!! Of course you need a Polaroid (I borrowed one) and film, glue to paste the pictures in the book. I also bought a quality set of Staedtler felt tip markers so they could write a message in different colors. It would also behoove you to get the DJ involved so everyone visits the Guestbook Area.



Encourage your friends to be creative and write something fun. If you can see from one of these pictures, a couple of my friends blacked their teeth out so I would be sure to miss the gang from South Carolina. Hardy har har. Another wrote some sage advice to "remember to always laugh and dance".

So much of wedding is about "supposed to" and buying things out of some Pavlovian response. Think about what really matters to you. What do you want to be left with after the wedding? It was hard for me and I'm sure it's hard for anyone planning a wedding. Throw in a finite budget and it becomes even more important to discern what is the best option for your wedding day.

By the way, I think this a great memory book for anyone throwing a party, baby or bridal shower. You can even plan to do this for someone and present it to them as a gift. It is so fun to read what people write and see their smiling faces.