Travel albums - what's the best way?

Hello there! Thanks for dropping in.

I've been working hard at getting travel photos into albums lately and I've come across a few problems that I'm hoping you might be able to help me solve.

My hubby and I travel quite a bit and I keep a travel blog to update friends and family. I find this to be a great tool - it saves me having to tell everyone the same story over and over and it serves as a diary of the trip. I write up what we did, add in the best photos and post these updates regularly.

I have thought long and hard about how best to document a long trip. I take a LOT of photos when we travel. In the end, I decided that the albums would contain three different typres of pages:
        1. I print off my blog posts for an instant record of where we went and what we saw.
        2. I pick extra photos that I want a memory of and add them in using Project Life pages.
        3. I scrap my favourite photos and add those in as well.

So my albums contain a mix of A4 and 12 x 12 pages like the following.

I make a title page like this:

My Project Life pages are very basic. I have too many photos to spend a lot of time on these. I just add the basic details and don't add embellishments. I add memorabilia into the pockets where I can.

I print my blog posts onto A4 paper and add them to the album in standard plastic sleeves.

I add scrapbook pages in where appropriate.

I hope you're with me so far!

My problems are:

1. The blog posts: I print these on thick copy paper so the heavy inking on the photos doesn't show through the page, however the photos don't look good printed on copy paper. I tried using A4 photo paper and this looks a lot better, however it's much thicker which makes the album bulkier, something I'm trying to avoid. It's also a lot more expensive.

2. The Project Life pages: All those pockets and heavy-duty plastic pages add to the bulk.

3. Printing:  I print the photos at home which is very expensive when I'm printing off hundreds of them. I tried my local photo shop but got so frustrated with how slow the process was to print 3 x 4" photos that I gave up. It's much quicker on my own computer!

4. The A4 plastic sleeves - I haven't found any that fit my 3-ringed albums so I have to cut slots to fit. This is time consuming and the slots catch on the album rings.

Does anyone have any suggestions for any of my problems above, or have any other ideas on how to efficiently create albums with lots of stories and photos? Do you do things differently to me? I'd love to hear your thoughts and tips.

Thank you so much :)


Happy scrappin'!

Heather