Tuesday, September 12, 2006

A Prayer Journal Kit to give as a gift

 


I have enjoyed my prayer journal so much that I got the idea to make up a prayer journal kit as a gift for a friend. I didn’t want to give it to her all assembled, because putting the journal together is half the fun. 

Here’s what I did: 

1. I bought a small binder with the clear “view pockets” front and back. I made cover inserts for both pockets. For the front insert, I used scrapbooking stickers to spell out “Terry’s Prayer Journal” and to decorate it, as this would be the cover. For the back insert, I wrote out some of my favorite quotes about prayer and added stickers to this also. 

2. Since I was using a small binder, I cut card stock sheets in half and punched holes in some and placed them in the binder. The rest, I put into a ziptop bag which was going to hold all of the other prayer journal kit materials. I cut sheets of plain white paper in half and added them to the bag, along with a hole punch. I added anything else I could think of that might enhance my friend’s prayer journal -- lots of stickers, some double stick tape, clear photo corners, pictures and quotes that might be useful, some of those cute “Pass it On” cards with Scripture, etc. I also included a nice scrapbooking marker with a fine point. You may well think of other great stuff to include. 

3. Now I had a binder for the journal itself and a bag full of materials, but I needed some sort of container to keep them all together. I looked at various plastic containers and even some tins, but nothing seemed right. 

 Since Terry’s full-time home is an RV, the container needed to be compact so she could stash it away, but had to look nice for times when she might want to leave it out. What I ended up with was a photo/video storage box. It worked perfectly! I paid less than $3 for it. They come in all sorts of colors and prints. Mine (which I already had on hand, having previously bought three of them for another purpose) was just a plain brown papier-mâché box -- exactly right, since Terry’s motor home is decorated in earth tones! 

 To decorate the box, I sort of half-followed some directions I had for decorating a Christmas memory box. Those directions called for making a color copy of a Christmas card or postcard to decorate the top. I thought I might make a copy of some fall cards I had on hand, but nothing seemed right. I ended up using some clip art I had gotten off the internet of a cup & saucer full of flowers. I cut this out -- there was a “dried flower” perched on the saucer and I cut around that so I could thread a charm on it. I glued the picture to the box using a glue stick, but when I threaded the charm on, I hot-glued the charm in place. (I used a neat little metal heart that says “made by hand with love”. I bought these from the Home-Sew catalog.) I also made up a couple of little signs in the word-processing program on my computer, one saying “Terry’s Prayer Journal Kit” and the other reading “Prayer Changes Things.” (You could also use Scripture verses, or any other sayings about prayer you like.) The finishing touch was one I borrowed from the Christmas memory box idea. I took a little frame (I had a package of 4 of these I’d bought at the dollar store -- the perfect size!) and took it apart and cleaned the glass. I cut a piece of scrapbooking paper to fit and glued it to the inside of the frame backing to make a background. Then I took some alphabet stickers made to look like typewriter keys (bought these at Jo-Ann’s) and arranged them on the backing to spell T-E-R-R-Y. (Wish I had thought to use some of those “Pop Dots” to make them more 3-D, but maybe for the next one!) Then I put the whole thing back into the frame, replacing the glass, and hot-glued the whole thing to the top of the box. It looked so cool! I added a few more stickers here and there, and voila! The box was finished. 

 I was very pleased with the result, and my friend absolutely loved it. A couple of ladies she showed it to now want to make some prayer journal kits for gifts, and perhaps some of my readers here would enjoy doing so as well. It's a simple enough project that one could complete several before Christmas!

3 comments:

  1. Anonymous7:12 PM

    Hi Mrs.T.
    I bought my notebook last week for my prayer journal, cut my divider pages and cut my paper pages. I went to the Dollar Store and bought some really cute scrap booking papers to cut up. So, now I am ready to start putting it together. I found the perfect print today for my cover...This is going to be fun! Not just the fun..but a working prayer journal too. Maybe I will get busy and get my FlyLady Control Journal done too.

    I have used a spiral notebook, like you did, for a prayer journal, but it just wasn't what I wanted. I think this is going to be just so perfect. I was wondering if you would post sometime some of your favorite quotes on prayer.

    Awhile back I came up with the idea of making my 6 year old granddaughter a prayer album. I found a purple and pink album (of course!) 4x6 inches. It has the clear pages that the photos slide into. I have been taking close up pictures of family, collecting simple Bible verses, stickers and anything that would appeal to her and draw her to use the album. It is much easier now that she can read. I will do a title page, Hannah's Prayer Journal, even though it is actually an album. I thought of making her a journal like the one I am making myself, but thought I could do that at a later time when she could write better.

    I love the gift storage box idea..you are just too clever!

    God Bless your day,
    Patty

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  2. Hi Patty,

    I was wondering if you'd been able to get started on your prayer journal yet -- and now I know! Have lots of fun assembling it! I am so impressed with what a great tool this is. Yesterday I made pages for my grandchildren -- they hadn't had their own pages before as I had just included them with their parents. But I've been impressed with the need of praying more for my grandchilden and felt this was a good place to start. I was surprised what a difference it made in how I pray for them.

    My FlyLady Control Journal is pretty much complete and it, too, is a wonderful tool -- but I'm guilty of not using it as much as I should. Still, my house is much better than it used to be -- progress is definitely being made -- and I actually did Kelly's Mission this morning!

    I LOVE the idea of a prayer album for your granddaughter. My oldest one is five, not reading yet, but one of those would make a super gift for her 6th birthday, I think. Thanks for the idea!

    Yes, I would be happy sometime to post some of my favorite quotes on prayer. I seem to have many more ideas for posts than I have time to post them, but that would be a relatively quick and easy one to do.

    Have a great day!

    God bless,
    Mrs.T

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  3. Good morning, L !!

    The smaller binders are what I do use to make the prayer journals. I find them much easier to use when praying. I just cut regular card stock and paper in half to use for the pages and dividers. It is a bit of work, but not hard -- just takes time. Then I just decorate these with stickers and write on them with scrapbooking markers (they don't bleed through the paper).

    My control journal is the full size binder, but there's no reason you couldn't use the smaller one. As far as printables, I haven't seen much either for the smaller binders, but they may well be out there. I haven't looked, but you could check the Avery site (www.avery.com) -- since they do make the smaller binders, maybe they have some helpful stuff for you. The site is worth a visit if you've never been there -- they have some wonderful free stuff.

    If you are going to just write your control journal info on the pages, you can just cut the pages and write on them as for the prayer journal.

    If you want to type your info and print it on your pages, I suggest that you try Page Setup in your word processing program -- you can just set it up to print sideways -- and you can also just set it for 2 columns (in some programs you set the number of columns by going to Format and then Section) , and it should then print out the size that will fit your binder. Just an idea! In any case, remember to follow FlyLady's advice and not get so hung up on perfecting your control journal that you never get around to using it! (Smile)

    Well, those are just a few thoughts I have, but if you have more questions don't hesitate to ask!

    Thanks for your kind words -- I so enjoy having you here at my kitchen table!

    God bless,
    Mrs.T

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