Art Journal Box for the Graduate

Daughter #4 graduated from high school this weekend. For each of my children I have created some sort of special scrapbook or album for them to take along on the new leg of their life journey. This time, I made a file box full of decorated file cards that have a combination of personal pictures and artwork. Since we both share a love of quotes, there are an ample supply of them to encourage and inspire her. Tabs provide suggested sections: family, beauty, faith, etc.

For the box, I used a old metal 4 x 6 card file, covered it with vintage book pages, and then painted it. These boxes also come in 3 x 5, and 5 x 7 sizes. How handy that they happen to fit standard photo sizes! It also makes it easy to use made to fit index cards, and tabbed file cards. I had a stash of old ones on hand that I use in journal making, so I was all set.

For many of the cards, I used actual photos and painted and stamped right on top of them. Some I printed in a washed out, gray scale version to serve as a background for my whimsy to play on.