Does anyone know how to get their blog printed anymore? I used Qoop once upon a time, and have the first 15 months in bound form- but I haven’t had anything bound since the end of 2006. I tried one of those sites that helps you create a PDF, but I think there’s just too much material here, because I couldn’t get it work. Either that or I am lame. Both are distinct possibilites.
The thing is, I’m worried about losing content and my writing, should anything happen. This is a documentary of my life, and I would hate to lose the last 40 months. (Okay, that’s not true- I wish very much that the last 40 months were a wicked dream I could wake up from, but you know what I mean? Right? Right.)
Anyone? Any ideas or sites you an recommend or know-how to share?
Dandelion Mama 
I’ve been working on my last two years in Blurb. About a year ago they came out with a way to slurp from wordpress (when I’d looked before it was only blogger and I think typepad). It’s not nearly as easy peasy as with blogprinting where it just took it and published it, though. You have to move photos around, choose page layouts, and all sorts of crap which is great if you want things a certain way and are willing to spend the time but I really liked how with blogprinting it just did it all quick and simple for me. So I’ve been fighting with Blurb to get the right photos in the right sizes with the right posts but it can be done. It just takes a lot more time and effort.
I just copy and paste into Word. Easy and cheap.
Shutterfly {http://www.shutterfly.com/} seems pretty neat. Not sure of pricing, but the end result is beautiful.
Then again, come to think of it, Shutterfly is more photos than text.
What about this one?
{http://www.blog2print.com/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=adwords&utm_campaign=feb09}
I just did mine through http://www.blog2print.com. It just pulls everything in for you and lays it out. I did have some problem with captions from the pictures being a little off, but I didn’t try to mess with it since I am a layout and design perfectionist and knew I would never stop and certainly never get it printed 🙂 The quality was really pretty good. For a book that had about 150 pages, it was $50 for a soft cover and $60 for hard cover. If you are interested, they just sent me a coupon in my email for 15% off that I won’t be using. Let me know if you want it.
If you copy and paste into word…I print my “word” journals at http://www.lulu.com
http://kelliemillerphotos.blogspot.com/2010/03/our-family-history-thus-far-one-of-my.html
http://kelliemillerphotos.blogspot.com/2010/03/family-history-books-explanation.html
Good luck! Love you!
Good suggestion! Cynthia, if you have that coupon and want to share, that would be great. I just uploaded, and it’s over 400 pages and $145! I won’t be buying it soon, but the coupon would help!. 😉 Thanks!
Ooh, this is exactly what I need to know…. soon. I’ve been procrastinating printing my blog until we have an income. Won’t that be fun to catch up on almost 5 years at once?!
I personally have used iPhoto (which takes a TON of time) in the past, but am looking to use Blurb for the next go around.
I like Blurb. they work wonderful and i think have reasonable prices.
Oh you must try Blurb.com! It has a function where it “slurps” your blog and all its text and pictures into their book-making software. You don’t need to cut and paste a thing. You do have to format your pages and play around with picture sizing, but that’s kinda fun anyway. I’ve made two Blurb blog books and love them both.
Oh… just thought of another thing. There’s one BIG difference between Blog2Print and Blurb: Blurb lets you choose only the posts you want included in your book, and it lets you edit your posts within the book. Unlike Blog2Print where you’re stuck with what you posted like a big brick. I had a few silly posts that weren’t worth binding forever, and I was glad I could cut those out with Blurb. It saves $$ too when the price is based on page count!
I’m currently in-process of making my second blurb book. Yes, it takes some time to lay out each page. Also, unless your pictures are thumbnail size, it has you re-grab them off your computer for higher resolution. So in the end, you have a really good-looking product. It takes me a couple months working on the book during TV commercials to get it done. 🙂 My first book was 18-months worth and I think it cost around $120-150.
I just made a sample book on blog2print. It was awesome because it took just a couple minutes, but the pictures are much smaller (probably because they skip the step of having you grab the files off your computer, so if the pics were bigger they’d be fuzzy). And it doesn’t let you customize the layout, enlarge pics, etc.
I like blurb because the pics are a huge part of what I want to preserve about my blog, so I make them nice and big.
I need to do this too, so thanks for the advice!
I used blog2print as well and thought the service was great. I did not do a price comparison though to find if anytone could do it cheaper. They pull everything out of your blog but video and you can add your own title, introduction, and choose your cover photos. I printed my first 2 years for about $70 in soft cover. I wish I had begun blogging as soon as I had my kids because it creates such a different picture of our daily life than the photo albums I have been keeping.
If you are having problems slurping your blog you may need to change some of your account settings.
Also, I just did a Blurb of my blog with 120 pages for around $40. . . .
400 pages… 400 pages… 400 pages…
I will add my endorsement of blurb. You can do a hard cover, image wrap, standard portrait book up to 440 pages for $95.95, + shipping. I have made 4 blurb books, one of the 1st year of my blog and 3 others that are essentially photo albums, and L-O-V-E them all. You save $$ if you do a soft cover.
Ooh! I think I need to check out blog2print. Like you, I have a million pages and am getting bogged down trying to rearrange everything in Blurb. It’s so tedious for something I’ve already taken so much writing and publishing on my blog. I just want it printed. It doesn’t have to be a work of art but I want it in a hard copy.
I used Blog2Print.com and have been pretty happy with the result. And I’ve done it five times now and don’t worry about losing my blog content at all.
They will also let you just buy a pdf file of it, which is really inexpensive.
=)
You can delete posts you don’t want to on Blog2Print. Someone mentioned you can’t but you can. I deleted all the posts I made on things I didn’t want printed and it was fine. You can’t edit posts though that you want printed. I just ordered 2 books at Blog2Print and can’t wait to see them. I did one book in Blurb, loved it BUT, it took SOOOO much time to make it all appear right. I don’t have that much time anymore to fiddle around with it.